Laparoscopic highly selective access to the liver for blood flow blocking anterior approach dissection

  Recently, the Minimally Invasive Hepatobiliary Surgery Department of Hunan Provincial People’s Hospital successfully completed a difficult case of laparoscopic highly selective hepatic blood flow blocking-an anterior approach anatomical right hepatectomy, which has not been reported in China.  The patient, a 69-year-old male, was admitted to the hospital because of a “giant tumor of the right liver” (11×1O×1Ocm3) found on physical examination. However, due to the patient’s age and large tumor, the tumor occupied segments VII and VIII of the liver, and hypertrophic segments V and VI were also involved, and the right hepatic vein was involved, so the whole right half of the liver had to be removed to achieve radical treatment, which was extremely difficult to operate, and only 40% of the normal liver could be left after the operation, and the chance of liver failure was high; if the operation was divided into two operations, it would increase the surgical trauma. Minimally invasive hepatobiliary surgery organized a collective discussion to fully demonstrate the feasibility of removing the huge right liver at one time, and formulated detailed preventive measures for the possible occurrence of liver failure after massive liver resection.  On June 19, 2014, under the guidance of Prof. Jin-Ju Wu, chief expert of Provincial People’s Hospital, Prof. Bo Jiang, vice president of Provincial People’s Hospital and president of Provincial Hepatobiliary Hospital, Prof. Xin-Min Yin, director of Minimally Invasive Surgery, and his surgical team used laparoscopic highly selective entry hepatic blood flow blocking-an anterior entry dissection method to perform right hemicolectomy in order to maximize the maintenance of residual liver function and reduce bleeding. After 7 hours of effort, the operation was successful with less than 300 ml of bleeding and no intraoperative blood transfusion. After the operation, under the careful treatment and care of the medical staff, the patient recovered smoothly without complications such as liver failure.  The operation applied three high-tech laparoscopic techniques, namely, highly selective entry hepatic blood flow block, anterior approach hepatic dissection and anatomical hepatectomy, in order to achieve safe and massive resection of the diseased liver, which is the first of its kind in China and brings hope and gospel to patients with massive hepatocellular carcinoma performing minimally invasive surgery.