Abstract
BACKGROUND: Recent studies have shown a lower risk of surgical site infections (SSI) after laparoscopic distal gastrectomy compared to open surgery. This is a phase 2 study aiming to determine the incidence of SSI after laparoscopic distal gastrectomy without using antimicrobial prophylaxis (AMP). METHODS: cT1N0 gastric cancers that were subject to laparoscopic distal gastrectomy were enrolled. Based on the unacceptable SSI incidence of ≥12.5% and the target SSI incidence of ≤5%, 105 patients were enrolled with an α of 0.05 and a power of 80% (ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT02200315). RESULTS: In intention-to-treat analysis, patients did not reach the target SSI rate (12.4%, 95% confidence interval = 6.8%-19.8%). Of patients, 44 patients had a protocol violation, such as extended lymph node dissection (LND) or inappropriate nonpharmacological SSI prevention measures. Per-protocol analysis excluding these patients (n = 61) showed a SSI rate of 4.9%, which was within the target SSI range. Multivariate analysis revealed that extracorporeal anastomosis and extended LND were independent risk factors for SSI. CONCLUSIONS: This study failed to reach the target SSI rate without using AMP. However, per-protocol analysis suggests that no AMP might be feasible when limited LND and adequate SSI prevention measures were performed.