Surgery for duodenal gastrointestinal stromal tumor: A systematic review and meta-analysis of pancreaticoduodenectomy versus local resection

The purpose of this study is to assess the clinical outcomes and prognostic factors for survival of patients with duodenal gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) who underwent pancreaticoduodenectomy (PD) or local resection (LR). PubMed database was searched for relevant studies. A meta-analysis was performed with Review Manager 5.3 software. Twenty-seven observational studies involving 1103 patients were included in the review. The overall morbidity and 30-day mortality was 27% and 0.5% respectively. The median (range) 5-year overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) rates were 87% (60-100%) and 71% (44-100%) respectively. In meta-analyses, factors associated with shorter DFS included male sex, mitotic index >5/50 high-power fields, high risk, tumor size >5 cm, and the PD procedure. Factors associated with shorter OS included mitotic index >5/50 high-power fields and tumor size >5 cm. Patients in PD group had a higher incidence of mitotic index >5/50 HPF, a higher incidence of high-risk classification, a higher incidence of tumors in the second portion of the duodenum, a larger tumor size, a longer duration of operation, more intraoperative blood loss, a greater blood transfusion requirement, a higher morbidity rate, a longer hospital stay, and an increased recurrence rate than those in LR group. In conclusion, the current literature review demonstrates that the postoperative prognosis of duodenal GIST is promising and mainly affected by tumor factors. The choice of the surgical approach should depend on the anatomical location and tumor size.