Study of endoscopic anatomy during retroperitoneoscopic radical nephrectomy / 中华泌尿外科杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To study the endoscopic anatomical structures in retroperitoneal space and to share experiences of retroperitoneoscopic radical nephrectomy. Methods Between January 2006 and March 2008, a total of 85 patients underwent retroperitoneoscopic radical nephrectomy. Thirty-eight tumors were on the left kidney and 47 on the right side. The mean tumor size was 5.5± 1.7 cm in diameter (2.5 to 10.5 cm). There were 74 cases in clinical stage T1N0M0 and 11 cases in T2N0M0. Following the principle of radical nephrectomy outside the renal fascia, the whole surgical procedure was performed along "2 spaces" and "2 poles". The ventral attachment of the kidney was dissected in anterior pararenal space between peritoneum and anterior renal fascia. The dorsal attachment was dissected in anterior psoas space between posterior renal fascia and psoas fascia. The cepha-lic attachment was dissected up to the subdiaphragmatic and down to iliac fosse. During the proce-dure, important anatomic structures such as parietal peritoneum and its reflexion, anterior renal fasci-a, lateroeonal fascia, posterior renal fascia, psoas muscles, greatvessels and their branches were care-fully identified. Results One case was converted to open surgery because of severe and extensive ad-hesion of the right kidney to the adjacent tissues. The other 84 procedures were successfully comple-ted. The median operative time was 65 rain (range 50 to 165 min) and median estimated blood loss was 58 ml (range 25 to 600 ml). Of all operations, peritoneum perforation occurred in 5 cases and small vessel injuries around renal pedicles were observed in 6 cases. Major complication such as great vessel injury was not observed. Mean follow-up of all 85 patients was 10 months (range 2 to 25 months). No local recurrence and port site tumor seeding was found. Conclusion During retrope-ritoneoscopic radical nephrectomy, studying anatomical features of renal area and recognizing impor-tant anatomic structures will help to improve the safety of the surgery and reduce morbidities.