[Video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery for lung cancer: current indications]

Recently, video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) has been widely applied in lung cancer surgery in Japan, although there is no consensus on the definition of VATS and its standard techniques. VATS lobectomy may result in long-term survival rates as high as after standard thoracotomy and is becoming an optional treatment for stage IA lung cancer. It is still not a standard treatment because of the problems of safety and oncologic radicality. However, as long as the safety and radicality are ensured by the tumor type, patient risk factors, and the expertise of the surgeon, less-invasive techniques like VATS should be performed.