Anastomotic complications associated with stapled versus hand-sewn anastomosis

To compare anastomotic complications of stapled versus hand-sewn cervical esophago-gastric anastomosis.

All patients undergoing esophageal resection are entered into a prospectively maintained database. The database was queried to identify patients who had near total esophagectomy with cervical esophago-gastric anastomosis. The effect of anastomotic technique and surgeon experience on anastomotic complications, leak, and stricture were analyzed.

Eighty-one patients underwent open or minimally invasive esophagectomy and gastric pull-up with or without thoracic mobilization. Eighteen patients had hand-sewn anastomosis and 63 had a partially stapled anastomosis. There was no significant difference between leak rate (22% (4/18) versus 7% (5/63) P = 0.09) and anastomotic stricture rate (38% (7/18) versus 26% (17/63), P = 0.34) between the two groups. Dividing the experience chronologically into three groups of 27 reveals a trend towards decreased leak rate with experience. The leak rate was only 3.7 % (1/27) in the most recent group compared with 14.8% (4/27) in the first group (P = 0.17).

In our experience, there was no significant difference in anastomotic complications between hand-sewn and stapled anastomosis. However, there is a decreasing trend in anastomotic complications with increasing surgeon experience.