Background: Appendiceal mucinous neoplasms present, in most patients, with peritoneal dissemination at the time of initial diagnosis. Patients may have a borderline tumor showing disseminated peritoneal adenomucinosis or an aggressive malignancy identified as peritoneal mucinous adenocarcinoma. Patients with these diagnoses were treated by cytoreductive surgery and perioperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy.
Methods: A database was established in 1998 that prospectively evaluated the morbidity and mortality of this group of patients. By using common toxicity grading criteria, 8 categories were scored on a grade of I to V. Grade IV indicated that the adverse event required urgent and definitive intervention: often a return to the operating room or to the surgical intensive care unit. Grade V indicated that the adverse events resulted in the patient's death. Adverse events were tabulated for each cytoreduction performed in these appendiceal malignancy patients.
Results: There were 356 procedures in patients taken to the operating room who received cytoreductive surgery with peritonectomy procedures plus heated intraoperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy. Only patients who had this combined treatment at our institution were included in the analysis. The total 30-day or in-hospital mortality was 2.0%. Nineteen percent of procedures were accompanied by at least one grade IV adverse event, and 11.1% of patients returned to the operating room. The most common category of grade IV complications was hematological (28%), followed by gastrointestinal (26%).
Conclusions: The mortality of 2.0% and the overall grade IV morbidity of 19% in these patients may be acceptable in light of modern standards for the management of gastrointestinal cancer.