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“Background: Malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM) is an aggressive disease of the pleural lining with a dismal prognosis. Surgical treatments of MPM with a curative intent include extrapleural pneumonectomy and extended pleurectomy/decortication (P/D). This meta-analysis aimed to compare the perioperative and long-term outcomes of EPP and extended P/D for selected surgical candidates. Methods: A systematic review of the literature was performed on six electronic databases to identify all relevant data on comparative outcomes of extended P/D and EPP in a multimodality setting. Endpoints included perioperative mortality

and morbidity, as well as long-term overall survival. Results: Seven relevant SN-38 research buy studies with comparative data on EPP (n = 632) versus extended P/D (n = 513) were identified from the current literature. Comparison of these two groups demonstrated significantly lower perioperative mortality (2.9% vs 6.8%, p = 0.02) and morbidity (27.9% vs 62.0%, p smaller than 0.0001) for patients who underwent extended P/D compared to EPP. Median overall survival ranged between 13-29 months for extended P/D and 12-22 months for EPP,

with a trend favouring extended P/D. Conclusions: Although it must be emphasized that patient selection and treatment strategies differ between EPP and extended P/D, a number of comparative studies have recently been conducted to compare these two surgical techniques CYT387 in vitro for patients with resectable MPM. Ro-3306 The present study indicated that selected patients who underwent extended P/D had lower perioperative morbidity and mortality with similar, if not superior, long-term survival compared to EPP, in the context of multi-modality therapy. This may represent an important paradigm shift in the surgical management of MPM. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Background: This study compared the efficacy and safety between 120-W thulium: yttrium-aluminum-garnet (Tm:YAG) vapoenucleation of prostates (ThuVEP) and holmium laser enucleation of prostates (HoLEP) for patients with lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) due to benign

prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). Methods: A retrospective analysis of 88 consecutive patients with symptomatic BPH was carried out, who underwent either 120-W ThuVEP or HoLEP nonrandomly. Patient demographics and peri-operative and 12-month follow-up data were analyzed with the International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS), quality of life (QoL) score, maximum flow rate (Qmax), postvoid residual urine volume (PVR), and rates of peri-operative and late complications. Results: The patients in each group showed no significant difference in preoperative parameters. Compared with the HoLEP group, patients in the 120-W ThuVEP group required significantly shorter time for laser enucleation (58.3 +/- 12.8 min vs. 70.5 +/- 22.3 min, P = 0.