Laparoscopic Colectomy for Colorectal Carcinomas

Fumio Konishi, Hideo Nagai and Kyotaro Kanazawa

Department of Surgery, Jichi Medical School

Laparoscopic assisted colectomy is considered to be less invasive, and patients have less pain and fast postoperative recovery. This operation is usually indicated for large sessile adenomas or for early invasive carcinomas, which are not suitable for colonoscopic removal. The indication of this procedure for more advanced colorectal carcinomas is controvertial. However, according to our experience of more than 100 cases, laparoscopic assisted colectomy is thought to be as curative as open colectomy provided the patients are properly selected. D3 lymphnode dissection for advanced colorectal carcinomas in the right colon or in the sigmoid colon is technically feasible under laparosocpic procedure, provided there are no significant obesity or wide spread adhesion due to the previous abdominal surgeries. There are reports on "port site recurrences", and the results of the long-term follow up should be analyzed. In this review, the methods of laparoscopic-assited right colectomy and sigmoidectomy are also presented.

Key words
colorectal carcinoma, laparoscopic-assited colectomy, lymphnode dissection

Reprint requests
Fumio Konishi Department of Surgery, Jichi Medical School 311-1 Yakushiji, Minamikawachi-cho, Kawachi-gun, Tochigi, 329-0498 JAPAN

Accepted
May 25, 1999

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