Minimally-invasive surgery in cancer children

Minimally-invasive, surgery, or video-assisted surgery, includes laparoscopy, retroperitoneoscopy and thoracoscopy, can be used for diagnosis (biopsies) and treatment (resections) in various malignant solid tumours in children. Potential advantages of MIS techniques include a decreased parietal trauma (cosmetic benefit. bowel adhesions) and less postoperative discomfort (postoperative pain, analgesics requirement, postoperative ileus, length of hospital Stay). Main indications of MIS techniques are represented by diagnostic biopsies (mediastinal or lung tumors, retroperitoneal extrarenal masses), resection of the primary tumor in thoracic and abdominal neuroblastic tumors and in post-treatment residual mass in lymphoma.