Robotic, Laparoscopic and Open Surgery for Gastric Cancer Compared on Surgical, Clinical and Oncological Outcomes

In the researchers' words

Gastric cancer represents a great challenge for health care providers and requires a multidisciplinary context in which surgery plays a main role. Minimally invasive surgery has been progressively developed, first with the advent of laparoscopy and more recently with the spread of robotic systems, but a number of issues are currently being debated, including the limitations in performing effective extended lymph node dissections and, in this context, the real advantages of using the robotic systems, the possible role for the Advanced Gastric Cancer, the reproducibility of completely intracorporeal techniques and the oncological results achievable during follow-up. A multicenter study with a large number of patients is now needed to further investigate the safety and efficacy as well as long-term outcomes of robotic surgery, traditional laparoscopy and the open approach.