The surgical outcome of minimally invasive pharyngo-laryngo-oesophagectomy in prone position

PURPOSE: Pharyngo-laryngo-oesophagectomy (PLE) which is mainly indicated for cervical oesophageal cancer or synchronous double cancer of the thoracic oesophagus and the pharynx or larynx, is extremely invasive. Since minimally invasive oesophagectomy (MIE) using video-assisted thoracic surgery has become popular recently, the procedure can be adopted to PLE. Moreover, the use of the prone position (PP) in MIEs has been increasing recently because technical advantages and fewer post-operative complications were reported. To assess the validity of PP, this study compared surgical outcomes of minimally invasive PLE (MIPLE) in PP with that in the left lateral decubitus position (LLDP). PATIENTS AND METHODS: This study enrolled consecutive 15 patients that underwent MIPLE with LLDP (n = 7) or PP (n = 8) between January 1996 and October 2016. The patients’ background characteristics, operative findings and post-operative complications were examined. RESULTS: Eligible diseases are 5 cases of cervical oesophageal cancer, 9 cases of synchronous double cancer of the thoracic oesophagus and head and neck and 1 case of cervical oesophageal recurrence of the head-and-neck cancer. The patients’ background characteristics were not significantly different. During surgery, thoracic blood loss was significantly lower in PP than in LLDP (P = 0.0487). Other operative findings and post-operative complications were not significantly different between the two groups. CONCLUSIONS: In MIPLE, the PP could reduce blood loss due to the two-lung ventilation under artificial pneumothorax and was associated with lower surgical stress than LLDP.