Laparoscopic splenectomy for primary immune thrombocytopenia: Current status and challenges

Primary immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) is an immune-mediated disorder affecting both adults and children, characterised by bleeding complications and low platelet counts. Corticosteroids are the first-line therapy for ITP, but only 20%-40% of cases achieve a stable response. Splenectomy is the main therapy for patients failing to respond to corticosteroids for decades, and about two-thirds of patients achieve a long-lasting response. Although some new drugs are developed to treat ITP as second-line therapies in recent years, splenectomy is still the better choice with less cost and more efficiency. Laparoscopic splenectomy (LS) for ITP proves to be a safe technique associated with lower morbidity and faster recovery and similar hematological response when compared to traditional open splenectomy. Based on the unified hematological outcome criteria by current international consensus, the response rate of splenectomy should be reassessed. So far, there are not widely accepted preoperative clinical indicators predicting favorable response to LS. Since the patients undergoing surgery take the risk of complications and poor hematological outcome, the great challenge facing the doctors is to identify a reliable biomarker for predicting long-term outcome of splenectomy which can help make the decision of operation.