University of Cincinnati surgeons say minimally invasive lung surgery should be standard care

"Thoracoscopic lobectomy should be considered the standard of care for patients with early-stage lung cancers", stated Michael Reed, MD, assistant professor of surgery at UC and minimally invasive thoracic surgeon at the University Hospital. "But few surgeons offer the procedure because it's difficult and requires a lot of additional training."

"We've shown that with a predetermined, step-by-step plan - guided by highly experienced minimally invasive thoracic surgeons - thoracoscopic lobectomy can be integrated safely into thoracic surgical training programmes", Dr. Reed added.

Using this strategy, the UC surgeons have increased the number of minimally invasive lobectomies they perform by about 57 percent over four years. Dr. Reed estimates 75 percent of all lobectomies at the University Hospital are now done using the minimally invasive approach. Prior to implementation of the training programme, only about 18 percent of lobectomies were performed minimally invasively.

Dr. Reed presented the findings on June 29, at the Western Thoracic Surgical Association's annual meeting in Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico. Dr. Reed and his UC colleague, Sandra Starnes, MD, conducted a four-year review of thoracic surgical cases at the University Hospital and the Cincinnati Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center to compare minimally invasive lobectomies performed by their team before and after implementation of a formal training programme.

The Cincinnati team has trained two cardiothoracic surgery fellows and more than a dozen community thoracic surgeons to perform minimally invasive lung surgery. "The key to implementing this programme into our practice was having a dedicated team of extensively trained thoracic surgeons with expertise in both open and minimally invasive, video-guided techniques", added Dr. Starnes. "This isn't a procedure you can perform confidently after just a few cases - mentorship and experience are key."

Collaborators in this study include Mark Lucia; Sandra Starnes, MD; Walter Merrill, MD; and John Howington, MD, who completed this work at the University of Cincinnati and is now in private practice at Evanston Hospital in Illinois.