Laparascopic Surgery Does Not Improve Outcomes Over Open Resection for Rectal Cancer

the Oncology Nurse Advisor take:

Compared with open surgery, laparascopic surgery fails to improve outcomes for patients with stage 2 or 3 rectal cancer, two studies published in JAMA have shown.

In the first study, researchers sought to determine whether laparoscopic resection is noninferior to open resection in patients with more advanced-stage rectal cancer.

Researchers randomly assigned 240 patients to undergo laparoscopic resection and 222 to undergo open resection. Results showed that the minimally invasive surgery did not improve cancer control as well as the open surgery did.

“Pending clinical oncologic outcomes, the findings do not support the use of laparoscopic resection in these patients,” the authors of the first study conclude.

In the second study, researchers enrolled 475 patients with T1 to T3 rectal adenocarcinoma less than 15 cm from the anal verge and randomly assigned them to undergo open laparotomy and rectal resection or laparoscopic rectal resection.

Results of this study also demonstrated that laparoscopic surgery was not noninferior to open surgery for successful resection; however, overall quality of surgery was high among patients who underwent the laparoscopic surgery.

“The findings do not provide sufficient evidence for the routine use of laparoscopic surgery,” the authors of the second study conclude.