Definitive Treatment Of Primary Spontaneous Pneumothorax A 10 Year Experience

Primary spontaneous pneumothorax (PSP) is defined as a pneumothorax without obvious underlying lung disease. Definitive treatment should be offered to patients with recurrent or persistent PSP. The aim of this study was to compare the effectiveness of medical pleurodesis (MP) with video assisted thoracic surgery (VATS) on definitive treatment of PSP.

10 years' retrospective study of PSP patients that underwent VATS or MP. Baseline characteristics, perioperative and follow-up data were compared.

A total of 133 patients were included (MP=54; VATS=79). Baseline characteristics were similar between groups, with a male predominance (MP 83.6 vs VATS 85.5%) with a mean age of 24.78 and 25.81 years old, respectively. Post interventional length of hospital stay was similar (MP 4.94 vs VATS 4.47 days, p=0.20), but chest tube duration was longer in the VATS group (MP 2.94 vs VATS 3.56 days, p=0.03). The overall complications rate was low with no statistically significant difference between groups (MP 5/54 vs VATS 7/79, p=1.00). Regarding the follow-up, MP had a significant higher PSP recurrence rate (MP 11.1% vs VATS 1.3%, p=0.042), most occurring over the first two years.

Despite both MP and VATS are safe methods with short hospital stay and few complications associated, the results of this study show that VATS had a significantly lower rate of recurrences. Overall, VATS should be offered as the first line treatment to patients with PSP.