Background/aims: Although diagnosis and surgical treatment for distal common bile duct cancer have enormously advanced, survival is not satisfactory and its prognostic factors are still being debated. Thus, we evaluated the outcomes and prognostic factors after major resection for distal extrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (dCC).
Methods: One hundred and fifty-four patients who underwent major resection such as pancreatic oduodenectomy for dCC were retrospectively analyzed. We investigated clinical features, postoperative complications, survival, and prognostic factors of dCC.
Results: One hundred and three (66.9%) male and 51 (33.1%) female patients were enrolled and their mean age was 59.6 (31-78) years. Among them, 97 patients (63.0%) underwent Whipple's procedure, 45(29.2%) pylorus-preserving pancreatic oduodenectomy, 7 (4.5%) total pancreatectomy, and 5 (3.3%) hepatopancreaticoduodenectomy, respectively. Mean follow-up duration was 26.6 (0.4-108.5) months. The postoperative morbidity and mortality were 42.2% and 1.3%, respectively. Five-year survival rate was 32.8% and mean survival duration was 47.2 (39.1-55.3) months. Type of biliary drainage (percutaneous transhepatic biliary drainage), lymph node status (positive), and cellular differentiation (moderate or poor) were significant indicators for death in multivariate analysis of resectable dCC.
Conclusions: Moderate or poor cellular differentiation and lymph node metastasis maybe independent poor prognostic factors for resectable dCC.