Uniportal thoracic surgery. Initial Experience

Introduction: video assisted thoracic surgery is widely accepted today as a safe, feasible and effective procedure to treat almost all thoracic conditions. In 2010, uniportal complex procedures begin to appear in scientific publications around the world, evidencing major expansion. This surgical approach is at least comparable to the multiportal approach in terms of postoperative results or even in regards to pain, intercostal neuralgia and length of hospital stay. We performed a retrospective study of uniportal procedures between September 2018 and August 2020. Results: 40 patients underwent uniportal thoracic surgeries. 18 of these were subject to anatomic resections (45%), 19 to atypical resection (non-anatomic), one thymectomy and two pleural biopsies, 12 lobectomies (30%), 3 neumomectomies (7,5%) and 3 segmentomectomies (7,5%). In 6 patients the procedure was converted to an open surgery (15%) and one patient died for respiratory sepsis. As to the occurrence of complications, 8 complications were seen in anatomic resections (5 major complications) and 4 complications in non-anatomic resections (2 major complications). One patient reported pain that lasted over one week in the postoperative stage, another one referred paresthesia and two reported dyspnea. Length of stay in the hospital was 8 days in anatomic resections and 5.8 days of pleural drainage, whereas in non-anatomic resections it was 5.5 and 3.3 respectively. Conclusion: uniportal surgery is safe and feasible in a relatively small health center.