Hand-assisted thoracoscopic surgery for pulmonary metastasectomy through sternocostal triangle access: superiority in detection of non-imaged pulmonary nodules.

Hand-Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgery for pulmonary metastasectomy through sternocostal triangle access allows manual palpation of both lungs, thus permitting effective treatment of lung metastases. In our research, 62 patients from November 2001 to January 2012 underwent our Hand-Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgery procedures for pulmonary metastasectomy. Clinical data, including the number of pulmonary metastases determined by Computed Tomography/Positron Emission Tomography-Computed Tomography, surgical findings and survival data of these patients were collected. We found that the median follow-up time was 23.7 months (range 2.4 to 85.6 months). 30 cases of them had post-operative recurrences and the median disease-free survival period was 27.4 months. For Computed Tomography scan, the overall sensitivity for proved metastases was 63% (115/182). 67 non-imaged malignant nodules were palpated and removed in 14 cases. For Positron Emission Tomography-Computed Tomography scan, the overall sensitivity was 66% (79/120). 41 non-imaged malignant nodules were palpated and removed in 12 cases. This study show that the Hand-Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgery provides an easier way for routine bilateral pleural exploration, and thus is critical and effective in detection of non-imaged malignant pulmonary metastases, which might contribute to long-term disease-free survival.

The prognostic value of serum HE4 in lung cancer / 中华放射医学与防护杂志

Objective The study was designed to investigate the serum levels of HE4 in patients with lung cancer,and explore its prognostic value.Methods Blood samples of 106 healthy adults and 191 patients with lung cancer before treatment were measured by means of ELISA for HE4 levels in different stages and pathological types,for analyzing prognostic effect of HE4.Results The serum levels of HE4 in patients with lung cancer (median level 91.63 pmol/L) were significantly higher than control group (median level 56.42 pmol/L) (U =3 081.00,P ＜ 0.05).AUC of serum HE4 was 0.85,with a cut-off value of 82.70 pmol/L (specificity =95.31％,sensitivity =62.32％).HE4 expression was not statistically related to clinical stage and pathological types of lung cancer.The median overall survival (mOS) was 36.87 months in the HE4-low group and 30.43 months in the HE4-high group (P ＜0.05),respectively.HE4 level was an independent prognostic factor for overall survival (HR =2.15,95％ CI 1.49-3.12,P ＜ 0.05).Conclusions The prognosis of patients with high HE4 expression is poor.Therefore,it might be necessary for patients with high level of HE4 to receive more aggressive adjuvant therapy.