Patterns of recurrence and survival after abdominal versus laparoscopic/robotic radical hysterectomy in patients with early cervical cancer

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:sec><jats:title>Aim</jats:title><jats:p>This study investigates the pattern of disease recurrence and identifies the clinicopathologic prognostic factors for patients with International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) stage IB and IIA cervical carcinoma treated with laparoscopic/robotic radical hysterectomy (LRH/RRH).</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Methods</jats:title><jats:p>We conducted a retrospective analysis of 128 patients with FIGO stage IB and IIA cervical cancer. Preoperative examination did not uncover definitive evidence of parametrial invasion or lymph node metastasis in any of the patients; therefore, all patients underwent LRH/RRH with retroperitoneal lymphadenectomy between <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">April</jats:styled-content> 2006 and <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">December</jats:styled-content> 2013. Sites of disease recurrence and all possible clinicopathologic factors related to the risk of disease recurrence were determined.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Results</jats:title><jats:p>Multivariate analysis demonstrated that laparoscopic intracorporeal colpotomy (<jats:italic>P</jats:italic> < 0.041, odds ratio 7.038, 95% confidence interval 1.059–15.183) represented a strong prognostic factor related to disease recurrence. We categorized the minimally invasive surgery group into LRH through vaginal colpotomy (LRH‐VC; 79 patients) and LRH/RRH through intracorporeal colpotomy (LRH/RRH‐IC; 49 patients) according to the colpotomic approaches. Disease recurrence was higher in the LRH/RRH‐IC group than in the LRH‐VC group (16.3% vs 5.1%, <jats:italic>P</jats:italic> = 0.057), with five patients in the LRH/RRH‐IC group experiencing intraperitoneal spreads.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Conclusions</jats:title><jats:p>Total laparoscopic/robotic intracorporeal colpotomy under CO<jats:sub>2</jats:sub> pneumoperitoneum may carry a risk of positive vaginal cuff margin, as well as intraperitoneal tumor spreads in patients with early‐stage cervical cancer treated with LRH/RRH.</jats:p></jats:sec>