Prophylactic Strategy for Peritoneal Recurrence after Curative Operation in Pancreatic Cancer

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Pancreatic cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer-related death in industrialized countries, and is well known as a miserable disease with the overall 5-year survival rate ranging from 7% to 25% after potentially curative surgical operation. One of the major features of pancreatic cancer is its early peritoneal dissemination as well as liver metastasis after curative surgical treatment. Peritoneal recurrence was found in more than half of the patients, which determines the high mortality rate. To improve longterm survival, multidisciplinary approaches combined with surgery whenever possible have been adopted to try to eradicate the recurrent patterns, but these measures do not seem to improve survival any more than that by standard resection. Although it is thought that the minimal cancer cells that already existed at the site of recurrence (Micrometastasis) at the time of surgery may be a mechanism of recurrence. The surgical operation itself might have caused the peritoneal dissemination of these cancer cells. In fact, it has been proven that surgical procedures for gastrointestinal cancers disseminate cancer cells into the systemic circulation and or intra-peritoneal space. If possible, this type of cancer dissemination should be eradicated at the time of the surgical operation.