Comparison of laparoscopic versus conventional open surgical staging procedure for endometrial cancer

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study was to compare the surgical outcomes of laparoscopic surgery and conventional laparotomy for endometrial cancer. Methods: A total of 104 consecutive patients were non-randomly assigned to either laparoscopic surgery or laparotomy. All patients underwent comprehensive surgical staging procedures including total hysterectomy, bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy, and pelvic/para-aortic lymphadenectomy. The safety, morbidity, and survival rates of the two groups were compared, and the data was retrospectively analyzed. Results: Thirty-four patients received laparoscopic surgery and 70 underwent laparotomy. Operation time for the laparoscopic procedure was 227.0±28.8 minutes, which showed significant difference from the 208.1±46.4 minutes (p=0.032) of the laparotomy group. The estimated blood loss of patients undergoing laparoscopic surgery was 230.3±92.4 mL. This was significantly less than that of the laparotomy group (301.9±156.3 mL, p=0.015). The laparoscopic group had an average of 20.8 pelvic and 9.1 para-aortic nodes retrieved, as compared to 17.2 pelvic and 8.5 para-aortic nodes retrieved in the laparotomy group. There was no significant difference (p=0.062, p=0.554). The mean hospitalization duration was significantly greater in the laparotomy group than the laparoscopic group (23.3 and 16.4 days, p＜0.001). The incidence of postoperative complications was 15.7 % and 11.8 % in the laparotomy and laparoscopic groups respectively. No statistically significant difference was found between the two groups in th