Simultaneous Resection of Colorectal Cancer With Synchronous Liver Metastases

Synchronous colorectal cancer with liver metastases, defined as the diagnosis of a primary colorectal tumour and liver metastases within 12 months, is a common problem faced by colorectal and hepatobiliary surgeons.(Adam) The "traditional approach" is to perform staged resections unless the liver resection required is limited (i.e. small wedges of peripheral lesions). The downside of performing staged vs. simultaneous resections is that patients must undergo two major operations instead of one, which limits a patient’s ability to return to their pre-surgical state of health in a timely fashion, increasing health care costs (Ejaz) and delaying the start of adjuvant chemotherapy. The disadvantages of a simultaneous approach include longer operating room times potentially increasing the major postoperative complication rate including blood transfusions, surgical site infections, anastomotic leaks and post-hepatectomy liver failure. Recent data from tertiary cancer centres suggest that simultaneous resection of the colon and rectum along with liver resection of any magnitude is feasible and safe.(Silberhumer) Although encouraging, this data comes from specific patients from a highly selected institution, results that are perhaps not generalizable.
This proposal is a feasibility study consisting of a pilot single arm prospective study at two different large-volume Hepatobiliary Centres of patients with synchronous colorectal cancer with liver metastases undergoing simultaneous resection of the colon or rectum and liver to evaluate their complication rates (including the calculation of the comprehensive complication index), quality of life, cost evaluation, and proportion of eligible patients recruited over a 12-month period. The results of this pilot study will provide us with the information necessary to build a large multicentre randomized controlled trial comparing staged vs. simultaneous resection for synchronous colorectal cancer liver metastases.