Chemotherapy within 30 days before surgery does not augment postoperative mortality and morbidity

Turan A et al. – Preoperative use of neoadjuvant chemotherapy in cancer patients undergoing resection surgeries was not associated with a higher rate of early postoperative complications or mortality.

Methods

• The authors evaluated 971,455 patients from the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database.
• Patients were defined as having chemotherapy when they were given any chemotherapy for malignancy within 30 days before surgery.
• They successfully matched 1,348 pairs of chemotherapy recipients and non–recipients.

Results

• Twenty–one of the 1,348 (1.6%) non–chemotherapy patients died within 30days after surgery compared with 30 of the 1,348 (2.2%) chemotherapy patients.
• Twenty–one of the 1,348 (1.6%) non–chemotherapy patients died within 30days after surgery compared with 30 of the 1,348 (2.2%) chemotherapy patients.
• The most common complication observed was wound infection in 13.1% of non–chemotherapy patients compared with 14.2% of the chemotherapy patients.
• There was similarly no difference between groups for the collapsed composite of major morbidities [OR=1.17; 95% CI 0.97 to 1.42; P=0.09].

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