Safety of total gastrectomy without nasogastric and nutritional intubation

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the safety of gastrectomy without nasogastric and nutritional intubations. Between January 2010 and August 2015, 74 patients with gastric cancer received total gastric resection and esophagogastric anastomosis without nasogastric and nutritional intubations at the First Department of Digestive Surgery of the XiJing Hospital of Digestive Diseases (Xi'an, China), of whom 42 were also received earlier oral feeding within 48 h. The data were retrospectively analyzed. An additional 301 cases who underwent traditional postoperative intubation were used for comparison. In patients without intubation compared with those managed traditionally with intubation, the mean operative time was decreased (190.97±38.18 vs. 216.12±59.52 min, respectively; P=0.026). In addition, the postoperative activity was resumed earlier (1.16±0.47 vs. 1.36±0.84 days, respectively; P=0.009), oral food intake was started earlier (4.28±1.79 vs. 5.71±2.66 days, respectively; P=0.009), the incidence of fever was lower (12.16 vs. 29.23%, respectively; P=0.003), and the incidence of total complications was not statistically significantly different between the two groups (9.41 vs. 6.31%, respectively; P=0.317). There were no significant differences regarding complications of the anastomotic port (1.37 vs. 1.69%, respectively; P=0.849). Compared with traditional postoperative management, earlier oral feeding did not increase the incidence of complications (7.21 vs. 4.76%, respectively; P=0.557). Our results suggest that total gastric resection without nasogastric and nutritional intubation is a safe and feasible option for patients undergoing total gastrectomy.