Background: Peritoneal carcinomatosis can be actually treated by new surgical and oncological techniques. Aim of this work is to report preliminary results of a group of patients with peritoneal carcinomatosis, submitted to peritonectomy and intraperitoneal hypertermic chemoperfusion (IPHC).
Methods: Age, sex, type of neoplasm, peritoneal carcinomatosis index (PCI), completeness of cytoreduction (CC), operative time, morbidity and mortality of patients submitted to IPHC have been considered.
Results: From May 2001 to December 2004, 10 patients were submitted to peritonectomy and IPHC: 9 (90%) females and 1 (10%) male, aged from 49 to 72 years. Seven patients (70%) were affected of peritoneal carcinomatosis from ovarian tumor, three patients (30%) from colon cancer. The PCI was ranged from 8 to 25. The operative time was ranged from 6 to 14 hours. Two patients with a CC of 2 developed relaps and died respectively after 2 and 4 months. The remaining patients had a CC between 0 and 1. Of these last patients, 1 affected by ovarian cancer died 24 months after, 1 patient died 3 days after surgery for septic shock; the other patients are still alive with a period ranged from 1 to 30 months.
Conclusions: Our preliminary results suggest that the peritonectomy and IPHC can be effective only in patients with CC of 0 or 1, in the remaining cases these therapeutical methods should be avoided.