Endosonography With or Without Confirmatory Mediastinoscopy for Resectable Lung Cancer:A Randomized Clinical Trial

PURPOSE:Resectable non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with a high probability of mediastinal nodal involvement requires mediastinal staging by endosonography and, in the absence of nodal metastases, confirmatory mediastinoscopy according to current guidelines. However, randomized data regarding immediate lung tumor resection after systematic endosonography versus additional confirmatory mediastinoscopy before resection are lacking.METHODS:Patients with (suspected) resectable NSCLC and an indication for mediastinal staging after negative systematic endosonography were randomly assigned to immediate lung tumor resection or confirmatory mediastinoscopy followed by tumor resection. The primary outcome in this noninferiority trial (noninferiority margin of 8% that previously showed to not compromise survival, Pnoninferior &lt;.0250) was the presence of unforeseen N2 disease after tumor resection with lymph node dissection. Secondary outcomes were 30-day major morbidity and mortality.RESULTS:Between July 17, 2017, and October 5, 2020, 360 patients were randomly assigned, 178 to immediate lung tumor resection (seven dropouts) and 182 to confirmatory mediastinoscopy first (seven dropouts before and six after mediastinoscopy). Mediastinoscopy detected metastases in 8.0% (14/175; 95% CI, 4.8 to 13.0) of patients. Unforeseen N2 rate after immediate resection (8.8%) was noninferior compared with mediastinoscopy first (7.7%) in both intention-to-treat (Δ, 1.03%; UL 95% CIΔ, 7.2%; Pnoninferior =.0144) and per-protocol analyses (Δ, 0.83%; UL 95% CIΔ, 7.3%; Pnoninferior =.0157). Major morbidity and 30-day mortality was 12.9% after immediate resection versus 15.4% after mediastinoscopy first (P =.4940).CONCLUSION:On the basis of our chosen noninferiority margin in the rate of unforeseen N2, confirmatory mediastinoscopy after negative systematic endosonography can be omitted in patients with resectable NSCLC and an indication for mediastinal staging.</p

Efficacy of an Autologous Blood Patch for Prolonged Air Leak: A Systematic Review

Background: Prolonged air leak after pulmonary surgery remains a clinical challenge and sometimes needs surgical reintervention. An autologous blood patch (ABP) may provide a noninvasive method to stop air leak. Its value, however, is debatable. The aim of this systematic review is to synthesize evidence regarding the efficacy of ABP in patients with prolonged air leak. Methods: A comprehensive search for published studies was performed in the Medline database, Embase, and the Cochrane library. Randomized controlled trials, case-control studies, and case series in which a postoperative ABP was performed were included. Findings from these studies were tabulated and data were synthesized graphically (PROSPERO registration number CRD42020157591). Results: A total of eight studies was included in the analysis, comprising 151 patients. Studies demonstrated heterogeneity in ABP timing and practice, and an intermediate to high risk of bias was scored. The majority of studies demonstrated a beneficial effect of the ABP, with a high rate of success of more than 89%. One randomized trial did not find a difference in time to cessation of air leak after ABP compared with conservative tube thoracostomy. The overall complication rate was 10%. Conclusions: Quality of included studies is limited owing to lack of comparison groups. Synthesized data in this review demonstrate a high rate of successful procedures and acceptable complication rates, and seems encouraging enough to justify a large randomized clinical trial on the use of ABP for patients who have prolonged air leak after thoracic surgery