Objective To systematically review risk factors for esophagogastric anastomotic leakage (EGAL) after esophageal cancer surgery for adults to provide theoretical basis for clinical prevention and treatment.Methods PubMed, Web of Science, The Cochrane Library, WanFang Data, VIP, CNKI and CBM were searched from inception to January 2020 to collect case control studies and cohort studies about risk factors for EGAL after esophageal cancer surgery. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data and assessed risk of bias of included studies, and then, meta-analysis was performed by using RevMan 5.3 software.Results A total of 33 studies were included, including 19 case-control studies and 14 cohort studies, all of which had a Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS)≥6. There were 26 636 patients, including 20 283 males and 6 353 females, and there were 9 587 patients in China and 17 049 patients abroad. The results of meta-analysis showed that the following factors could increase the risk for EGAL (P≤0.05), including patient factors (18): age, sex, body mass index (BMI), smoking history, smoking index (≥400), alcohol history, digestive tract ulcer, respiratory disease, lower ratio of forced expiratory volume in one second to forced vital capacity (FEV1/FVC), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), coronary atherosclerosis, peripheral vascular disease, arrhythmia, diabetes, hypertension, cerebrovascular disease, celiac trunk calcification and descending aortic calcification; preoperative factors (6): abnormal liver function, renal insufficiency, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) grading, neoadjuvant radiotherapy and preoperative albumin<35 g/L, preoperative lower albumin; intraoperative factors (7): retrosternal route, cervical anastomosis, thoracoscopic surgery, operation time≥4.5 h, tubular stomach, upper segment tumor, splenectomy; postoperative factors (5): respiratory failure, postoperative arrhythmia, use of fiberoptic bronchoscopy, pulmonary infection, deep venous thrombosis. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy could reduce the risk for postoperative EGAL (P<0.05). However, age≥60 years, upper gastrointestinal inflammation, diffusing capacity for carbon monoxide (DLCO%), thoracic surgery history, abdominal surgery history, glucocorticoid drugs history, neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy, anastomotic embedding, end-to-end anastomosis, hand anastomosis, intraoperative blood loss and other factors were not significantly correlated with EGAL.Conclusion Current evidence suggests that the risk factors for postoperative EGAL include age, sex, BMI, smoking index, alcohol history, peptic ulcer, FEV1/FVC, COPD, diabetes, ASA grading, neoadjuvant radiotherapy, preoperative albumin<35 g/L, cervical anastomosis, thoracoscopic surgery, operation time≥4.5 h, tubular stomach, upper segment tumor, intraoperative splenectomy, postoperative respiratory failure, postoperative arrhythmia and other risk factors. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy may be the protection factor for EGAL. Due to limited study quality, more high quality studies are needed to verify the conclusion.

Citation： NIE Hongxin, WANG Bing, YANG Sihao, LIU Honggang, MENG Hui. Risk factors for esophagogastric anastomotic leakage after esophageal cancer surgery: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Chinese Journal of Clinical Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, 2022, 29(2): 166-178. doi: 10.7507/1007-4848.202010024 Copy

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