Laparoscopic and robotic surgeries for colorectal cancer present both the same advantages in comparison to open procedures in terms of faster recovery. However, our data do not seem to support the routine use of RCO as a cost-effective procedure.

Fascin, an actin-bundling protein involved in cell motility, has been shown to be upregulated in several types of carcinomas. In this study, we investigated the expression of fascin in 228 advanced colonic adenocarcinoma patients with a long follow-up. Fascin expression was compared with several clinicopathologic parameters and survival. Overall, fascin immunoreactivity was detected in 162 (71%) tumours with a prevalence for right-sided tumours (Po0.001). Fascin correlated significantly with sex, tumour grade and stage, mucinous differentiation, number of metastatic lymph nodes, extranodal tumour extension, and the occurrence of distant metastases. Patients with fascin-expressing tumours experienced a shorter disease-free and overall survival in comparison with those with negative tumours, and fascin immunoreactivity emerged as an independent prognostic factor in the multivariate analysis. Moreover, patients with the same tumour stages could be stratified in different risk categories for relapse and progression according to fascin expression. Our findings suggest that fascin is a useful prognostic marker for colonic adenocarcinomas.

The impact on survival of the number of lymph nodes removed in patients with node-negative gastric cancer has not been established. This study suggests that more extended lymph node resection offers protection, as patients who had ≤15 nodes removed had significantly worse disease-free survival and overall survival at multivariate analysis than patients in whom >15 nodes were removed.

No abstract