Definition and scope of the surgical treatment in patients with pulmonary metastases from colorectal cancer

Abstract

Surgical treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer in lungs is a relatively new trend of modern oncology. In this connection, still there are no clearly formulated criteria for patient selection for this type of intervention, approaches to repeated resections and scope of the surgical operation in case of multiple lesions. Established key prognostic factors include lesion of intrathoracic lymph nodes, timing of the development of metastatic disease, baseline level of carcinoembryonic antigen, number of foci and the volume of metastatic lesion, stage of the disease. Options for surgical access include lateral thoracotomy, sternotomy, thoracoscopy and thoracoscopy combined with additional minithoracotomy.If a patient has a single peripheral metastatic lesions, physician should prefer thoracoscopic operations. One of their advantages include minimum development of adhesions and possibility of subsequent re-thoracoscopy. Resection of pulmonary metastases from colorectal cancer (R0 resection rate) allows to achieve persistent healing of the tumor process in a significant number of patients.

Keywords

• colorectal cancer
• pulmonary metastases
• thoracoscopic resection