Comparison of Long-Term Outcomes Between Conversion to Open and Laparoscopic Subtotal Cholecystectomy in the Difficult Gallbladder: A Single-Center Retrospective Study

Abstract

Background

A difficult laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) confers an increased risk of bile duct injury. Traditionally, surgeons convert to open cholecystectomy (OC) as a bailout procedure for safer dissection. Laparoscopic subtotal cholecystectomy (LSC) has recently gained favor with comparable short-term complication rates, but differences in long-term outcomes remain unknown. We sought to compare long-term biliary outcomes between OC and LSC.

Study Design

We performed a single-center retrospective cohort study of adults who underwent non-elective LC converted to OC or LSC due to difficult dissection from 1/1/2015 to 12/31/2019. The primary outcome was a composite measure of postoperative biliary events, and we used time-to-event analysis to compare the 2 groups. We evaluated secondary outcomes using Chi-squared or independent t-tests as appropriate.

Results

Of 1089 patients who underwent non-elective LC, 68 (6%) underwent a bailout procedure (30 OC vs 38 LSC). There were no differences in demographics or comorbidities between the groups. Most patients (84%) had acute cholecystitis. Average follow-up times were 40 ∓ 29 months in OC and 54 ∓ 21 months in LSC. Biliary events occurred in 13 total patients (19%) with OC most commonly suffering bile leak (17%) and LSC most commonly having choledocholithiasis (11%). Kaplan-Meier analysis demonstrated no significant difference in biliary events between the groups (P = 0.71). Secondary outcomes were all similar between groups, except LSC had a shorter length of stay (2.9 ∓ 2.3 vs 5.1 ∓ 3.6 days, P = 0.002).

Conclusions

OC and LSC demonstrated comparable long-term biliary outcomes. In a difficult LC, surgeons may perform either bailout procedure to safely manage the gallbladder.