RETRACTED: Videotoracoscopia exploradora y videopericardioscopia en la estadificación definitiva y valoración de la resecabilidad del cáncer de pulmón

[Video-assisted thoracic surgery, lung transplantation and mediastinitis: major issues in thoracic surgery in 2010]

We reviewed the major issues in thoracic surgery relating to the advances made in our specialty in 2010. To do this, the 43(rd) Congress of the Spanish Society of Pneumology and Thoracic Surgery held in La Coruña and the articles published in the Society's journal, Archivos de Bronconeumología, were reviewed. The main areas of interest were related to the development of video-assisted thoracic surgery, lung transplantation and descending mediastinitis. The new tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) classification (7(th) edition), presented last year, was still a topical issue this year. The First Forum of Thoracic Surgeons and the Update in Thoracic Surgery together with the Nurses' Area have constituted an excellent teaching program.

SEPAR guidelines for lung cancer staging

The latest tumour, lymph node and metastasis (TNM) classification by the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC), based on the analysis of patients from all over the world, has incorporated changes in the descriptors, especially those regarding tumor size, while proposing new group staging. A new lymph node map has also been developed with the intention of facilitating the classification of the "N" component. SEPAR recommends using this new classification. As for the procedures recommended for staging, in addition to the generalized use of computed tomography (CT), it points to the role of positron emission tomography (PET) or image fusion methods (PET/CT), which provide a better evaluation of the mediastinum and extrathoracic metastases. Endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS) and esophageal ultrasound (EUS) for obtaining cytohistological samples have been incorporated in the staging algorithm, and it emphasizes the importance of precise re-staging after induction treatment in order to make new therapeutic decisions. Comment is made on the foreseeable incorporation in the near future of molecular staging, and systematic lymph node dissection is recommended with the intention of making a more exact surgical-pathological classification.

[Thoracic surgery 2009]

Started with tuberculosis and developed in parallel with smoking and cancer and under the protection of anaesthesia, thoracic surgery appeared in the 1980's as a specialty with a difficult long-term survival. However, with the development of lung transplant, tracheal surgery, the appearance of video-assisted thoracic surgery, along with the confirmation that despite the excellent progress of chemoradiotherapy, surgery continues to be the best option for curing lung cancer, means that it is currently a specialty of great growth and a wider scope in the future.