Int J Med Sci 2019; 16(2):337-342. doi:10.7150/ijms.28016 This issue Cite
Research Paper
1. Department of Anesthesiology, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, the Second Military Medical University, 225 Changhai Road, Shanghai, China.
2. Department of Anesthesiology, Shanghai Shuguang Hospital, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, 528 Zhangheng Road, Shanghai, China.
3. Department of Anesthesiology, Renji Hospital, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 160 Pudian Road, Shanghai, China.
4. Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, the First Affiliated Hospital of the University of South China, 69 Chuanshan Road, Hunan, China.
*Hao Gao, Xiao-Yan Meng and Hong-Qian Wang contributed equally to this work.
Background: Recently published studies suggest that the anaesthetic technique used during oncologic surgery can improve patient outcomes. Therefore, the authors evaluated the survival of patients with resected colorectal carcinoma liver metastases (CRCLMs) who received either EGA (general anaesthesia [GA] combined with epidural anaesthesia [EA]) or GA alone.
Methods: We conducted an ambispective cohort study including 225 post-surgical CRCLM patients between May 2007 and July 2012 and performed a follow-up investigation of survival in July 2017.
Results: The basic characteristics in the two groups were largely similar. The median (quartiles) recurrence interval for all patients was 10 (2.5, 23) months, and the median (quartiles) survival for CRCLM patients post-surgically was 37 (30.5, 51.5) months. Perioperative EA was associated with survival (P =0.039, log-rank test), with an estimated hazard ratio of 0.737 (95% CI 0.551-0.985) in the univariate analysis. Kaplan-Meier estimates of survival for GA and EGA suggested that GA might provide better outcomes than EGA [P=0.028, hazard ratio of 0.7328 (95% CI 0.5433-0.9884)]. Significant differences in anaesthesia techniques were found (P=0.048), with an adjusted estimated hazard ratio of 0.741 (95% CI 0.550-0.998) in the multivariate analysis. Subgroup analyses of patients in different age groups (< 40, ≥ 40 but <60, and ≥ 60 years old) suggested that no significant differences existed among all three subgroups.
Conclusions: Compared with EGA, GA may provide a better survival outcome for CRCLM patients. The benefits of anaesthetic techniques in oncological surgery are most likely related to certain cancer types.