title: Assessment of surgical technique and perioperative morbidity associated with extraperitoneal versus transperitoneal laparoscopic radical prostatectomy.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To compare the perioperative morbidity and surgical technique of the two main variants of laparoscopic radical prostatectomy: the more often used transperitoneal approach with primary dissection of the plane posterior to the seminal vesicles (TP-LRP) and a purely extraperitoneal approach (EP-LRP).
  
  
  METHODS
  Our initial 20 consecutive patients who underwent EP-LRP and the last 20 consecutive patients who underwent TP-LRP were included in this retrospective study. The two groups were well matched for age, American Society of Anesthesiologists score, body mass index, prostate-specific antigen level, and Gleason score. The mean time for completion of the individual laparoscopic steps was assessed for both approaches.
  
  
  RESULTS
  With EP-LRP, the mean operative time was shorter (169.6 minutes versus 224.2 minutes, P <0.001) and patients resumed a full diet earlier (mean 1.6 days versus 2.6 days, P = 0.002). The mean total dose and duration of morphine administration were higher in the TP-LRP group, but the difference was not statistically significant (6.0 mg versus 12.8 mg and 0.5 day versus 0.9 day, respectively). The catheter time was nearly identical in the two groups (mean 5.3 days with TP-LRP and 4.2 days with EP-LRP). The incidence of positive margins was not affected by the surgical approach.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These preliminary results suggest that the initial posterior dissection associated with TP-LRP is less efficacious than direct access of the prevesical space during EP-LRP. Measures of perioperative morbidity were at least equivalent, if not superior, for the EP-LRP technique. These findings, together with the significant decrease in operative time with EP-LRP, appear sufficiently important to abandon the transperitoneal technique.
authors.affiliation: Service d'Urologie, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Henri Mondor, Créteil, France.
authors.forename: Andrs
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hoznek
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Antiphon
authors.forename: Tomasz
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Borkowski
authors.forename: Matthew T
authors.initials: MT
authors.lastname: Gettman
authors.forename: Ran
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Katz
authors.forename: Laurent
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Salomon
authors.forename: Safwat
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zaki
authors.forename: Alexandre
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: de la Taille
authors.forename: C lment-Claude
authors.initials: Cl
authors.lastname: Abbou
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D006801:Humans; D010535:Laparoscopy / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010537:Peritoneum / Q000601:surgery; D011182:Postoperative Care / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011468:Prostatectomy / Q000379:methods*; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000601:surgery*; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012669:Seminal Vesicles / Q000601:surgery; D013997:Time Factors; D016896:Treatment Outcome