Purpose: The aim of this study was to determine factors associated with the adoption of minimally invasive surgery (MIS) compared with laparotomy in the treatment of endometrial cancer and to compare surgical outcomes and survival between these two surgical modalities.
Methods: We utilized the National Cancer Data Base (NCDB) to identify women diagnosed with presumed early-stage endometrial cancer between 2010 and 2012. We also identified factors associated with the performance of MIS and utilized propensity score matching to create a matched cohort of women who underwent minimally invasive staging surgery or laparotomy for surgical staging.
Results: Overall, 20,346 women were eligible for inclusion in the study; 12,604 (61.9%) had MIS, while 7742 (38.1%) had a laparotomy. African American race (odds ratio [OR] 0.54, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.49-0.60], Hispanic ethnicity (OR 0.70, 95% CI 0.61-0.80), Charlson score >2 (OR 0.79, 95% CI 0.69-0.91), high-grade histology (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.59-0.68), presumed clinical stage II disease (OR 0.53, 95% CI 0.46-0.60), and surgery at a community cancer program (OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.39-0.55) or in the Midwest region (OR 0.70, 95% CI 0.64-0.76) were associated with a decreased likelihood of having MIS, while private insurance (OR 1.69, 95% CI 1.45-1.97) and highest quartile median household income (OR 1.13, 95% CI 1.03-1.24) were associated with an increased likelihood of having MIS. After propensity score matching, there was no association between minimally invasive staging surgery and 3-year overall survival (hazard ratio 1.03, 95% CI 0.92-1.16).
Conclusion: There are notable racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, and geographic variations in the utilization of MIS for endometrial cancer staging in the US. After controlling for the aforementioned factors, MIS had a similar 3-year survival compared with laparotomy in women undergoing staging surgery for endometrial cancer.