Routine Staple Line Reinforcement for Minimally Invasive Distal Pancreatectomy

Distal pancreatectomy (DP)is the standard surgical method for benign or malignant pancreatic tumors locating at body and tail \[1\]. Clinically relevant postoperative pancreatic fistula (CR-POPF) is the major complication after pancreatectomy. In literature, reported CR-POPF rate after distal pancreatectomy varied between 5% and 64% from different centers. It's still a challenge to prevent CR-POPF via effective pancreatic remnant closure and no consensus on the optimal surgical technique has been established. Reported surgical strategies to prevent CR-POPF included stapler transection, staple line reinforcement, stump coverage with autologous tissue or fibrin glue, mesh reinforcement, and prophylactic administration of octreotide. However, none had convincing outcome \[2-4\]. Data has shown that staple line plus suture reinforcement might potentially decrease the CR-POPF rate of patients who underwent distal pancreatectomies, but well-designed high-quality evidence is lacking. Meanwhile, prior researches have commonly included minimally invasive and open cases together. Moreover, stapler and suture were combined in most studies making interpretation difficult \[5-8\]. Thus, the investigators design a single-centered, parallel, randomized controlled trial to compare the efficacy of routine staple line plus reinforcement versus staple only on the CR-POPF rate of participants who underwent minimally invasive distal pancreatectomies.