Obesity: A risk factor for postoperative complications in laparoscopic surgery for colorectal cancer

The prevalence of obesity in the Eastern Mediterranean is increasing significantly up to 20.8% in 2016. Therefore, a higher percentage of colorectal cancer (CRC) patients are expected to be obese. Laparoscopic colorectal cancer surgery (LCRCS) is regarded as a safe and feasible procedure as laparoscopic approach is becoming the gold standard in CRC surgery, especially in the early stages of disease. However, LCRCS is correlated with a higher risk of short-term post-operative complications in obese patients (body mass index [BMI] ≥30 Kg/m 2 ) than in patients with BMI <30 Kg/m 2 . This study aims to evaluate the impact of obesity on short-term post-operative complications in patients undergoing LCRCS.

A retrospective study was conducted. Clinical data of case and control patients were extracted from medical records. These patients underwent LCRCS between January 2018 and June 2021 at Hôtel-Dieu de France Hospital, Beirut-Lebanon. Patients were divided into two groups: obese and non-obese. BMI ≥30 Kg/m 2 was used to define obese patients. Post-operative complications in the 30 days following surgery were the primary outcome. The severity of post-operative complications was evaluated using the Clavien-Dindo score. Chi-square test was used to evaluate the statistical correlation between collected variables.

We identified 107 patients who underwent LCRCS during this study period at our institution. Among the patients, 23 were obese (21.49%). At 30 days post-operative, 26 patients were reported to having at least one complication. Non-significant differences were found between the two groups regarding the early post-operative complications rate (obese 26.1% and non-obese 23.8% with P = 0.821). Obesity was not demonstrated as a stratification risk by severity of the early post-operative complications ( P = 0.92).

Obesity, which was defined as BMI ≥30 Kg/m 2 , was not a risk factor for early post-operative complications as well as a stratification risk by severity of post-operative complications in LCRCS.