Laparoscopic Transhiatal Esophagectomy at a Low-Volume Center

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Surgical treatment of esophageal cancer is associated with a high rate of morbidity, even in specialized centers. Minimally invasive esophageal resection has become increasingly feasible and is gaining popularity in some high-volume institutions. This study assesses the short-term outcomes of laparoscopic transhiatal esophagectomy performed by a single surgeon at a single low-volume institution over a 20-month period. METHODS Over the study period, 16 patients underwent laparoscopic transhiatal esophagectomy. All patients were men with an average age of 70 years (range, 50 to 81). RESULTS Two patients required intraoperative conversion to alternative surgical techniques, 1 to an Ivor-Lewis esophagectomy and 1 to an open transhiatal approach. Average operative time was 198 minutes (range, 147 to 303). Mean hospital stay was 16.7 days (range, 9 to 30). The average number of resected lymph nodes was 11.7, and 2 patients had benign pathology. No deaths occurred in the 30-day postoperative period. CONCLUSION Laparoscopic transhiatal esophagectomy is an advanced laparoscopic procedure that can be performed with equivalent morbidity and mortality by a low-volume surgeon in a low-volume center with results comparable to those of high-volume centers. While several authors have demonstrated a correlation between lower mortality rates and high-volume esophagectomy hospitals, our results support surgeon experience as more important than the absolute number of procedures performed each year.