Future Opportunities in Thoracic Surgery: The Cutting Edge: 2nd Edition

A special issue of Journal of Clinical Medicine (ISSN 2077-0383). This special issue belongs to the section "Respiratory Medicine".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 August 2025 | Viewed by 2101

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Thoracic Surgery, Sant'Andrea Hospital, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
Interests: thoracic surgery; thoracic oncology; lung cancer; sleeve resections; savage surgery
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This is the second edition of the Special Issue “Future Opportunities in Thoracic Surgery: The Cutting Edge”.

Nowadays, lung cancer is still the leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide, and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for nearly 85%. Surgery is considered the treatment of choice for early-stage lung cancer, whereas locally advanced cancers are considered for multi-modal treatments, including neoadjuvant and adjuvant therapy, beside surgery.

Mortality reduction for NSCLC over the past decade is partly attributed to enhanced treatments and many ongoing clinical trials have reported encouraging outcomes based on new surgical and oncological aspects. In fact, limited resections as segmentectomies are considered the new standard for surgical treatment for early stage lung cancer up to 2 centimeters of diameters and immunotherapy has been introduced in the neoadjuvant multimodal treatment for advanced stage lung cancer.

In this fascinating era of important innovations, it would be interesting to debate about the novel surgical and oncological strategies. Dealing with surgery, it would be interesting to understand the indications for parenchymal sparing techniques compared to standard surgery, to achieve the same oncological results. Considering the wide spread of target- and immunotherapies, even the indication for surgery not also for curative intentions but even for diagnostic necessities in advanced stage lung cancer is under debate, in order to collect a wide portion of tissue for molecular profile.

Immunotherapy has improved curative effects, prognosis, and tolerability compared with traditional chemotherapy. It would be interesting analyzing the effect of novel pre- and post-surgical therapies and the impact of novel therapies on tissue during surgery.

Dr. Giulio Maurizi
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • surgical resection
  • immunotherapy
  • target therapy
  • thoracic surgery
  • thoracic oncology
  • lung cancer

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15 pages, 278 KiB  
Review
Video-Assisted vs. Robotic-Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgery in Lung Cancer: A Comprehensive Review of Techniques and Outcomes
by Dina Sbeih, Mayar Idkedek and Firas Abu Akar
J. Clin. Med. 2025, 14(5), 1598; https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm14051598 - 26 Feb 2025
Viewed by 1976
Abstract
Lung cancer is the primary cause of cancer-related mortality globally; hence, several medical and surgical approaches have been developed for its management. This can be easily recognized with the evolution from the traditional open thoracotomy toward minimally invasive procedures—in particular, video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery [...] Read more.
Lung cancer is the primary cause of cancer-related mortality globally; hence, several medical and surgical approaches have been developed for its management. This can be easily recognized with the evolution from the traditional open thoracotomy toward minimally invasive procedures—in particular, video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) and robotic-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (RATS)—in treating lung cancer. There has been a lot of controversy around the advantages and limitations of these procedures. VATS has been proven to be beneficial in treating early-stage lung cancer. Yet, the restricted mobility of its instruments, as well as the lack of a three-dimensional visualization of anatomical components, make the new RATS desired. RATS uses advanced technology, which has resulted in an exceptional high-definition, three-dimensional image of the working field. This has also led to fine dissection with great precision and accuracy, better lymph node removal, reduced postoperative recovery time, and better outcomes. Compared to VATS, there is less blood loss, shorter hospital stays, and less pleural effusion drainage. Despite its higher cost due to the expensive surgical systems, training and maintenance fees, and longer operative time, RATS has started to gain more use, potentially enhancing patient outcomes as experience and technological improvements progress. Full article
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