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©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Surg. Nov 27, 2016; 8(11): 744-754
Published online Nov 27, 2016. doi: 10.4240/wjgs.v8.i11.744
Published online Nov 27, 2016. doi: 10.4240/wjgs.v8.i11.744
Critical analysis of the literature investigating urogenital function preservation following robotic rectal cancer surgery
Sofoklis Panteleimonitis, Jamil Ahmed, Amjad Parvaiz, Department of Colorectal Surgery, Poole Hospital, Dorset BH15 2JB, United Kingdom
Sofoklis Panteleimonitis, Mick Harper, Amjad Parvaiz, School of Health Sciences and Social Work, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth PO1 2UP, United Kingdom
Author contributions: Panteleimonitis S and Ahmed J performed the literature search and searched all the retrieved abstracts; Panteleimonitis S wrote the paper; Ahmed J, Harper M and Parvaiz A reviewed and edited the paper to its final format; all authors read and revised the final manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors of this manuscript have no conflicts of interest to declare.
Data sharing statement: The technical appendix, statistical code and dataset are available from the corresponding author at sofoklis_p@hotmail.com.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Sofoklis Panteleimonitis, MBChB, BSc, MRCS, Research Fellow in Colorectal Surgery, School of Health Sciences and Social Work, University of Portsmouth, University House, Winston Churchill Avenue, Portsmouth PO1 2UP, United Kingdom. sofoklis_p@hotmail.com
Telephone: +44-7721-773383
Received: May 24, 2016
Peer-review started: May 25, 2016
First decision: July 6, 2016
Revised: August 19, 2016
Accepted: September 7, 2016
Article in press: September 8, 2016
Published online: November 27, 2016
Peer-review started: May 25, 2016
First decision: July 6, 2016
Revised: August 19, 2016
Accepted: September 7, 2016
Article in press: September 8, 2016
Published online: November 27, 2016
Core Tip
Core tip: Urogenital dysfunction is a significant problem following rectal cancer surgery that significantly affects quality of life. Despite laparoscopic total mesorectal excision becoming the standard approach in much of the developed world, the incidence of post-operative urogenital dysfunction remains high. Robotic surgery allows for precision surgery in the pelvis, therefore enabling better preservation of the pelvic autonomic nerves. Current studies examining the urogenital outcomes following robotic rectal cancer surgery have several limitations, but suggest that robotic surgery may offer favourable outcomes when compared to laparoscopic and open surgery. Larger scale prospective studies are required to validate these results.