Recent experience with laparoscopic appendectomy in a Canadian teaching centre.

OBJECTIVE Laparoscopic appendectomy (LA) remains controversial in our city, in part because of results obtained early in the learning curve. In 1995, our centre reported that LA took 30 minutes longer and yet resulted in similar length of hospital stay, compared with open appendectomy (OA). The purpose of the current study is to reexamine LA now that more experience has been gained with the procedure and to document the learning curve at a typical Canadian teaching centre. METHODS We undertook a retrospective chart review of patients undergoing nonelective appendectomy between January 2001 and June 2004; this yielded 201 charts that satisfied the inclusion criteria. The 201 cases were divided into 3 groups, each consisting of 67 consecutive cases, to allow for comparison between early, middle and late experience. The main outcomes of interest were operative time, length of stay and the changes over time that occurred in these 2 measures. An intent-to-treat analysis was performed. RESULTS The mean operative time differed by only minutes: 54.9 (standard error of mean [SEM] 1.9) minutes for LA and 48.8 (SEM 1.4) minutes for OA (p = 0.004). Length of stay was 1.3 (SEM 0.1) days and 2.9 (SEM 0.2) days for LA and OA groups, respectively (p 0.0001). Analysis of the 3 time periods (early, middle and late) revealed significant improvements in operative time and length of stay for LA in the middle, compared with the early, time periods. CONCLUSION These data suggest that, with experience, LA operative time approaches that of OA and length of stay decreases. A shortened hospital stay and similar operative time, along with educational advantages, support the use of the LA in teaching centres.