Long-term Outcomes of Laparoscopy-assisted Gastrectomy for T4a Advanced Gastric Cancer: A Single-center Retrospective Study

Abstract

Laparoscopy-assisted gastrectomy (LAG) has been proven to be feasible and oncologically safe for early gastric cancer. Despite the rapid increase in the number of LAG cases, there are few reports on the long-term outcomes of T4a (serosalinvasion) gastric cancer after LAG. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the long-term clinical outcomes in patients with stage T4a gastric cancer after laparoscopic gastrectomy. A total of 578 patients with gastric cancer were treated with LAG between February 2004 and December 2014. Among these patients, 224 patients were pathologically confirmed with T4a advanced gastric cancer. The clinical and follow-up data were retrospectively analyzed, the survival rates were estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method, and the risk factors for overall and disease-free survival (DFS) were evaluated by Cox regression. Among these 224 patients, 129 patients were above 60 years old, and the male-to-female ratio was 157:67. Furthermore, among these patients, 125 patients received laparoscopy-assisted distal gastrectomy, whereas 99 patients received laparoscopy-assisted total gastrectomy. Forty (17.90%) patients experienced postoperative complications according to the Clavien-Dindo classification. Median follow-up time was 32 months. Recurrence was observed in 99 (44.20%) patients. The cumulative 5-year overall survival (OS) and DFS rates were 47.20% and 43.60%, respectively. The 5-year OS and DFS rates were 72.50% and 70.00% for stage N0, 57.00% and 53.90% for stage N1, 41.60% and 37.00% for stage N2, and 23.30% and 21.30% for stage N3, respectively. In the univariate analysis, tumor size, tumor location, N stage and metastatic lymph node ratio (MLR) were correlated with OS and DFS. The MLR was identified as an independent predictor for OS (P<0.05; hazard ratio=1.828; 95% confidence interval, 1.353-2.469) and DFS (P<0.05; hazard ratio=1.197; 95% confidence interval, 0.945-1.516). The long-term outcomes of LAG for T4a (M0) gastric cancer were acceptable, compared with previous reports. Therefore, this treatment could be considered as an alternative operative approach for T4a gastric cancer. The MLR was an independent predictor for OS and DFS.