Comparison of Acute and Chronic Surgical Complications Following Robot-Assisted, Laparoscopic, and Traditional Open Radical Prostatectomy Among Men in Taiwan

IMPORTANCE: Few studies have evaluated long-term surgical complications in patients with prostate cancer (PC) who receive open radical prostatectomy (ORP), laparoscopic radical prostatectomy (LRP), or robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (RARP). OBJECTIVE: To examine the perioperative and postoperative surgical complications among patients with PC who underwent ORP, LRP, or RARP. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This cohort study included patients who received a diagnosis of resectable PC and underwent RP between January 1 and December 31, 2015. Participants were enrolled in the Taiwan Cancer Registry. The index date was the date of surgery, and the follow-up duration was the period from the index date to December 31, 2018. Data analysis was performed in September 2020. EXPOSURES: ORP, LRP, or RARP. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Two multivariate mixed models accounting for hospital clusters were fitted to ascertain the association of RARP with treatment outcomes (ie, hospital stay, blood transfusion, postoperative pain, erectile dysfunction, urinary incontinence, and hernia); general linear regression models were used for continuous outcomes, the amount of blood transfused, and hospital stay, and logistic regression models were used for analyzing postoperative outcomes and surgical complications. RESULTS: Of the 1407 patients included in this study, 315 (22.4%) received ORP (mean [SD] age, 66.4 [6.8] years), 276 (19.6%) received LRP (mean [SD] age, 66.8 [6.4] years), and 816 (58.0%) received RARP (mean [SD] age, 66.1 [6.7] years). Mean (SD) follow-up in the full cohort was 36.7 (4.6) months. No statistically significant differences were observed in age, clinical tumor stage, pathological tumor stage, Gleason score, Gleason grade group, preoperative prostate-specific antigen concentration, D’Amico risk classification, and hospital level. A shorter hospital stay was observed for patients undergoing RARP vs those undergoing ORP (mean [SE] difference, −1.64 [0.22] days; P < .001) and LRP (mean [SE] difference, −0.57 [0.23] days; P = .01). Patients undergoing RARP had lower odds of receiving a blood transfusion (RARP vs ORP: adjusted odds ratio [aOR], 0.25; 95% CI, 0.17-0.36; RARP vs LRP: aOR, 0.58; 95% CI, 0.37-0.91). For postoperative pain, RARP was associated with a decrease in the odds of moderate to severe postoperative pain for as long as 12 weeks compared with both ORP and LRP (eg, RARP vs LRP at week 12: aOR, 0.40; 95% CI, 0.19-0.85; P = .02). The aORs for RARP vs those for ORP and LRP in the third year after RP were, for erectile dysfunction, 0.74 (95% CI, 0.45-0.92) and 0.60 (95% CI, 0.36-0.98), respectively; for urinary incontinence, 0.93 (95% CI, 0.65-0.99) and 0.60 (95% CI, 0.42-0.86), respectively; and for hernia, 0.51 (95% CI, 0.31-0.84) and 0.82 (95% CI, 0.46-0.92), respectively. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: In this study, undergoing RARP was associated with fewer acute and chronic postoperative complications than undergoing ORP or LRP.