Improved cancer control with increasing surgical experience-the learning curve-was demonstrated for open and laparoscopic prostatectomy. In a prior single-center study, we found that this might not be the case for robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (RARP).
To investigate the relationship between prior experience of a surgeon and biochemical recurrence (BCR) after RARP.
We retrospectively analyzed the data of 8101 patients with prostate cancer treated with RARP by 46 surgeons at nine institutions between 2003 and 2021. Surgical experience was coded as the total number of robotic prostatectomies performed by the surgeon before the patient operation.
We evaluated the relationship of prior surgeon experience with the probability of BCR adjusting for preoperative prostate-specific antigen, pathologic stage, grade, lymph-node involvement, and year of surgery.
Overall, 1047 patients had BCR. The median follow-up for patients without BCR was 33 mo (interquartile range: 14, 61). After adjusting for case mix, the relationship between surgical experience and the risk of BCR after surgery was not statistically significant (p = 0.2). The 5-yr BCR-free survival rates for a patient treated by a surgeon with prior 10, 250, and 1000 procedures performed were, respectively, 82.0%, 82.7%, and 84.8% (absolute difference between 10 and 1000 prior procedures: 1.6% [95% confidence interval: 0.4%, 3.3%). Results were robust to a number of sensitivity analyses.
These findings suggest that, as opposed to open and laparoscopic radical prostatectomy, surgeons performing RARP achieve adequate cancer control in the early phase of their career. Further research should explore why the learning curve for robotic surgery differs from prior findings for open and laparoscopic radical prostatectomy. We hypothesize that surgical education, including simulation training and the adoption of objective performance metrics, is an important mechanism for flattening the learning curve.
We investigated the relationship between biochemical recurrence after robot-assisted radical prostatectomy and surgeon's experience. Surgeons at an early stage of their career had similar outcomes to those of more experienced surgeons, and we hypothesized that surgical education in robotics might be an important determinant of such a finding.
European urology oncology. 2022 Jul 15 [Epub ahead of print]
Carlo A Bravi, Paolo Dell'Oglio, Elio Mazzone, Marcio C Moschovas, Ugo Falagario, Pietro Piazza, Simone Scarcella, Christopher Bednarz, Luca Sarchi, Stefano Tappero, Sophie Knipper, Ruben De Groote, Daniel Sjoberg, Riccardo Schiavina, Nazareno Suardi, Carlo Terrone, Riccardo Autorino, Giuseppe Carrieri, Andrea Galosi, Antonio Galfano, Alberto Briganti, Francesco Montorsi, Vipul Patel, Andrew Vickers, Alexandre Mottrie
Department of Urology, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwziekenhuis Hospital, Aalst, Belgium; ORSI Academy, Ghent, Belgium; Division of Oncology/Unit of Urology, URI, IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele, Milan, Italy. Electronic address: ., Department of Urology, ASST Grande Ospedale Metropolitano Niguarda, Milan, Italy; Department of Urology, Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Hospital, The Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Interventional Molecular Imaging Laboratory, Department of Radiology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands., Division of Oncology/Unit of Urology, URI, IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele, Milan, Italy., AdventHealth Global Robotics Institute, Celebration, FL, USA., Urology and Renal Transplantation Unit, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, University of Foggia, Foggia, Italy., Department of Urology, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwziekenhuis Hospital, Aalst, Belgium; Division of Urology, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna, Italy., Department of Urology, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwziekenhuis Hospital, Aalst, Belgium; Division of Urology, United Hospital of Ancona, School of Medicine Marche Polytechnic University, Ancona, Marche, Italy., Division of Urology, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA., Department of Urology, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwziekenhuis Hospital, Aalst, Belgium., Department of Urology, ASST Grande Ospedale Metropolitano Niguarda, Milan, Italy; Department of Urology, Policlinico San Martino Hospital, University of Genova, Genova, Italy., Department of Urology, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwziekenhuis Hospital, Aalst, Belgium; Martini-Klinik Prostate Cancer Center, University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany., Department of Urology, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwziekenhuis Hospital, Aalst, Belgium; ORSI Academy, Ghent, Belgium., Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY, USA., Division of Urology, IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna, Bologna, Italy., Department of Urology, Policlinico San Martino Hospital, University of Genova, Genova, Italy., Division of Urology, United Hospital of Ancona, School of Medicine Marche Polytechnic University, Ancona, Marche, Italy., Department of Urology, ASST Grande Ospedale Metropolitano Niguarda, Milan, Italy.
PubMed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35850976