Background:Symptomatic palliation and nutritional support are important goals of care in patients with obstructive, unresectable esophageal cancer.Obstruction often develops as a natural course of the disease, creating a significant negative impact on quality of life and prognosis.This study J o u r n a l P r e -p r o o f aims to compare two palliative interventions for gastroenteric access in patients with obstructive, unresectable esophageal cancer. Methods:A single institution retrospective cohort study was conducted comparing endoscopic esophageal stent placement to surgical feeding tube placement.Patients diagnosed with unresectable esophageal cancer from 2010-2020 who underwent palliative gastroenteric access interventions were included. Results:A total of 286 patients were screened over the ten-year period, and 78 patients met inclusion criteria.Twenty-eight patients (35.9%) underwent initial stent placement while fifty (64.1%) underwent initial surgical feeding tube placement.Patients in the stent group had higher rates of reintervention vs surgical feeding tube group (25.6% vs 6.0%, p=0.006).Patients with surgical feeding tubes of any type had a higher rate of receiving their intended palliative oncologic treatment (82% vs 60.7%, p=0.039) compared to the stent group. Conclusion:Surgical enteral tube placements had lower rates of reintervention and higher rates of receiving their intended palliative oncologic treatment for patients with obstructive, unresectable esophageal cancer compared to esophageal stent placement.
Zee et al. (Fri,) studied this question.