Frequency of Polyps and Adenocarcinoma in Colon Interposition After Esophagectomy in Adulthood - A Systematic Review

Colon interposition counts among the most common techniques for reconstruction after esophagectomy. Availability of data on metachronous mucosal pathologies is weak. The aim of this review was to identify all reports on the development of metachronous adenoma and adenocarcinoma in colon interposition after esophagectomy in adulthood.

A comprehensive search was conducted in MEDLINE/PubMed, Science Direct, Cochrane Library, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München. All studies reporting on patients who received colon interposition as substitute after esophagectomy in adulthood for benign and malignant reasons were included.

Five retrospective studies were included, reporting on 1016 patients. Therein, no interval lesion was identified. One further study, which formally must be excluded for a misfit to inclusion criteria reports on three interval carcinomas within 365 patients. Because these lesions were the only ones found within a cohort analysis, results were supplementary reported in this review. Additionally, 31 case reports including 32 patients with benign (n=7) or malignant (n=25) findings were analyzed. Median age was 63.5 years (interval carcinoma) and 69 years (benign lesion). Benign and malignant lesions were diagnosed after a median of 8.5 years.

Due to the rareness of respective cohort studies, the frequency of metachronous lesions cannot be calculated accurately. The estimated rate of interval carcinoma is 0-0.22%. Life-long endoscopic surveillance of patients with colon interposition is recommended.