vNOTES scarless and painless endometrial cancer staging surgery

Sentinel lymph node dissection is performed in endometrial cancer surgery instead of staging surgery, particularly when the disease is advanced and confined to the uterus. The aim of this study is to share our sentinel lymph node detection rates via the vaginal natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery method with the literature and to demonstrate a safer and more comfortable surgical treatment process.

The analysis includes the patients who underwent surgery sentinel lymph node dissection for endometrial cancer utilizing indociyanin green in our center between January 2022 and June 2024.

In all, of 24 endometrial cancer patients underwent surgery sentinel lymph node dissection, nonendometrioid (serous) pathology was observed in only 1 (4%) patient, our other patients (96%) had endometrioid adenocarcinoma pathology. The rates of our sentinel lymph node dissection bilateral and symmetric are 96% (23/24), 94% (22/24), and 79% (19/24), respectively. We would like to emphasize that we successfully used vaginal natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery approach on four of our patients who were unsuitable for laparoscopic and robotic surgery due to pain scores of 2 at the 12th hour after surgery and low lung capacity.

Vaginal natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery and sentinel lymph node dissection will be considered as surgical options in other gynecological cancers due to the comfort it brings to the patient in endometrial cancer.