Esophagocolonic OrVil Anastomosis After Minimally Invasive Esophagectomy

The classical colon substitution procedure is open surgery. Still, technological developments could allow a minimally invasive procedure that might improve patient outcomes. To present the efficacy and safety of esophagocolonic OrVil anastomosis after minimally invasive esophagectomy. This retrospective study included 10 patients with esophageal cancer treated with OrVil anastomosis (OA) between August 2017 and May 2021 at Department of Thoracic Surgery, Nanjing Lishui People's Hospital, Zhongda Hospital Lishui Branch, Southeast University, Nanjing, China and the Fourth Associated Hospital of Anhui Medical University. The patient's characteristic information and related perioperative indexes were collected from the hospital's electronic medical record system and the patients were followed up. The mean operative time and median intraoperative blood loss were 530 ± 88 minutes and 200 (range: 100-300) mL, respectively. A median of 26 (range: 13-30) lymph nodes was dissected per patient. The median total duration of hospitalization and postoperative hospitalization was 32 (range: 24-64) and 15 (range: 12-42) days, respectively. Seven (70%) patients had postoperative pulmonary infections. Two (20%) patients had postoperative respiratory failure. No esophagocolonic anastomotic leakage was observed in all cases. One patient was complicated with postoperative colonicoduodenal anastomotic leakage after the operation and was cured. However, 1 (10%) of the remaining 9 patients died from colonicolonic anastomotic leakage during hospitalization. The living 9 cases were followed up, and the median overall survival time was 36 months. Colonic interposition for esophageal cancer is effective and safe using the minimally invasive OA technique.