[Technical aspects of laparoscopic liver surgery : Transfer from open to laparoscopic liver surgery]

Laparoscopic surgery has become the standard for most visceral surgery procedures in many hospitals. Now, liver resections are also being increasingly carried out laparoscopically. The advantages of the laparoscopic technique have been demonstrated in numerous case series and in a recent randomized controlled trial.

The aim of this review article is to present the available techniques for laparoscopic liver surgery (LLS).

The technical variations reported in the literature as well as the own experience with LLS are reported.

Optimal patient and trocar positions are crucial for successful LLS and they are chosen according to the planned type of liver surgery: the literature offers several options in particular for surgery of the cranial and dorsal liver segments. As for open liver surgery, a restrictive volume management and the application of the Pringle maneuver are helpful to reduce intraoperative blood loss in LLS. In addition, several dissection techniques have been adopted from open liver surgery. The Cavitron Ultrasound Surgical Aspirator (CUSA™) is particularly suitable for parenchymal dissection close to major vascular structures, since it guarantees a meticulous parenchymal dissection with minimal vascular injuries.

The developments of minimally invasive surgery nowadays allow complex liver resections, which can mostly be performed comparable to open liver surgery. Hopefully, minimally invasive liver surgery will further develop in Germany in the near future, since it offers several advantages over open liver surgery.