The hyperthermic intraoperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy in the treatment of advanced abdominopelvic cancer. Personal experience on 103 procedures during a seventeen year period in a single Italian center.

OBJECTIVE: Integration of different therapeutic strategies in cancer surgery in the last years has led from treating primary lesions to the surgical treatment of metastases. The purpose of this paper is to report a single Italian center experience of treatment of peritoneal carcinosis of the abdominopelvic malignancies.

PATIENTS AND METHODS: 103 HIPEC procedures were performed in 17 years on 94 selected patients affected by abdominopelvic cancer. The PCI score was calculated at laparotomy. The CC score was calculated before doing HIPEC. HIPEC was carried out according to the Coliseum technique.

RESULTS: The surgical cytoreduction allowed 89 patients to be subjected to HIPEC treatment with a CC score 0; 9 patients with a CC 1; 3 patients with a CC 2 and 2 patients with a CC 3. In 22 patients postoperative complications were recorded. No operative mortality occurred. The median follow-up of 53 months shows a rate of survival equivalent to 49 %, with a relapse in 46 patients, 29 of them reached exitus.

CONCLUSIONS: The surgical resection alone for patients affected by advanced cancer with peritoneal carcinomatosis cannot be considered a sufficient treatment any longer and HIPEC would help to prolong survival in these patients.