Abstract:
Background Due to the inherent disadvantages of laparoscopic instruments such as the loss of several degrees of freedom, their applications in the treatment of mid-low rectal cancer in obese patients are limited. However, the definitive outperformance of the robotic system versus laparoscopic procedure when treating mid-low rectal cancer in the obese population remains to be determined.
Objective To evaluate the short-term outcomes of robotic versus laparoscopic surgery in obese patients with mid-low rectal cancer.
Methods Clinical data about obese patients with mid-low rectal cancer admitted to the Fifth Ward of the General Surgery Department in the First Medical Center of Chinese PLA General Hospital from February 2017 to August 2022 were retrospectively analyzed. According to the surgical procedure, the patients were divided into robotic group and laparoscopic group. After performing propensity score matching (PSM) of the baseline characteristics of the two groups, the indicators were compared to evaluate the short-term outcomes. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression were used to analyze the influencing factors of the occurrence of complications.
Results A total of 207 cases were screened for this study, including 108 cases in the robotic group and 99 cases in the laparoscopic group. After PSM, there were 66 patients in each group. The positive rate of circumferential incision margin (4.5% vs 15.2%, P=0.041) and the incidence of complications within 30 days after surgery (7.6% vs 22.7%, P=0.015) reduced significantly in the robotic group when compared to the laparoscopic group. Multivariate logistic regression analysis suggested that robotic surgery could reduce the incidence of complications within 30 days after surgery (OR: 0.269, 95%CI: 0.090-0.804, P=0.019).
Conclusion Compared with laparoscopic surgery, robotic surgery contributes to reducing the positive rate of circumferential resection margin and the incidence of complications within 30 days after surgery in obese patients with mid-low rectal cancer, and has certain advantages in improving short-term outcomes.