Stephen G. ReMine

Resection of the liver for colorectal carcinoma metastases. A multi-institutional study of long-term survivors.

In this review of a collected series of patients undergoing hepatic resection for colorectal metastases, 100 patients were found to have survived greater than five years from the time of resection. Of these 100 long-term survivors, 71 remain disease-free through the last follow-up, 19 recurred prior to five years, and ten recurred after five years. Patient characteristics that may have contributed to survival were examined. Procedures performed included five trisegmentectomies, 32 lobectomies, 16 left lateral segmentectomies, and 45 wedge resections. The margin of resection was recorded in 27 patients, one of whom had a positive margin, nine of whom had a less than or equal to 1-cm margin, and 17 of whom had a greater than 1-cm margin. Eighty-one patients had a solitary metastasis to the liver, 11 patients had two metastases, one patient had three metastases, and four patients had four metastases. Thirty patients had Stage C primary carcinoma, 40 had Stage B primary carcinoma, and one had Stage A primarycarcinoma. The disease-free interval from the time of colon resection to the time of liver resection was less than one year in 65 patients, and greater than one year in 34 patients. Three patients had bilobar metastases. Four of the patients had extrahepatic disease resected simultaneously with the liver resection. Though several contraindications to hepatic resection have been proposed in the past, five-year survival has been found in patients with extrahepatic disease resected simultaneously, patients with bilobar metastases, patients with multiple metastases, and patients with positive margins. Five-year disease-free survivors are also present in each of these subsets. It is concluded that five-year survival is possible in the presence of reported contraindications to resection, and therefore that the decision to resect the liver must be individualized.

Abdominal lymphoma. Role of surgery.

Although patients with localized gastrointestinal lymphoma have reasonable 5-year survival rates after resection and these rates seem improved with radiotherapy and chemotherapy, long-term survival rates in patients with advanced disease remain poor. The future of therapy for patients with non-Hodgkins lymphoma of the gastrointestinal tract lies with the multidisciplinary approach combining resection, debulking, radiotherapy, and multidrug chemotherapy.

Gastric and Small Bowel Lymphoma

Despite the vague presentation of gastric and small bowel lymphoma, survival can be achieved by adequate surgical resection of stage I disease. A role still exists for debulking of advanced stage disease by surgical excision. Debulking enhances potential for complete response with chemotherapy, decreases the risk of gastric and small bowel perforation with large exophytic tumors as they necrose with chemotherapy, and prevents gastrointestinal obstruction from limiting patients ability to receive chemotherapy. All attempts should be made to maintain nutritional support of these patients to allow them an adequate chance of receiving chemotherapy. The increasing frequency of immunodeficiency disorders will continue to produce higher numbers of patients with non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Awareness of our surgical limitations is important because surgical exploration is frequently the first step. Multimodality therapy of gastric and small bowel lymphoma offers the best chance for successful outcome. Surgical resection should not prevent patients from receiving a complete trial of chemotherapy and radiation if appropriate.

Unilateral hepatic duct obstruction

Abstract Experience with unilateral hepatic duct obstruction is limited. We reviewed 33 cases of unilateral hepatic duct obstruction from a total of 500 patients with biliary reconstruction treated between 1965 and 1984. The median age of the patients reviewed was 56 years. The most common cause of unilateral hepatic duct obstruction was operative injury (73 percent of patients). Including operations for unilateral obstruction, patients in the series underwent 131 operations related to biliary tract problems. The most common presentation (73 percent of patients) was fever and pain. Obstruction was more common in the right duct than in the left duct by a ratio of 2:1 (22 patients versus 11 patients). The three types of surgical procedures used were hepaticojejunostomy (17 patients), dilatation and drainage (13 patients), and primary hepatic resection (3 patients). Atrophic hepatic lobes resulting in rotational deformity of the portal structures were resected in six patients with combined hepatic duct and arterial injury. No operative deaths occurred, although 51.5 percent of the patients had postoperative complications. Follow-up studies ranging from 1 to 16 years demonstrated that patients who had hepaticojejunostomy required less frequent reoperation compared with those who had dilatation (36 percent versus 64 percent) and had a lower postoperative mortality rate related to biliary tract problems (7 percent versus 18 percent). We conclude that unilateral hepatic duct obstruction continues to occur most commonly because of operative injury and is best treated by hepaticojejunostomy or by resection of chronically obstructed lobes when possible.