Background:Surgical resection is shown to present the best chance of cure in the treatment of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC). However, the appropriate length of the negative margin remains unclear. The aim of the present meta-analysis was to investigate whether a clear margin of 10 mm or more (≥10 mm) conferred any survival benefit over a margin of less than 10 mm (<10 mm) in patients with resected ICC.Methods:The meta-analysis was conducted in adherence with the PRISMA guidelines. PubMed, Web of Science, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library were systematically searched to identify eligible studies published in English from the initiation of the databases to February 2016. Overall survival rates were pooled by using the hazard ratio and the corresponding 95% confidence interval (CI). Random-effect models were utilized because of between-study heterogeneity.Results:Six studies (eight cohorts) reporting on 712 patients were analyzed: 269 (37.80%) were in the 10 mm or more negative margin group, and 443 (62.20%) were in the less than 10 mm negative margin group. The pooled hazard ratio for the less than 10 mm group was found to be 1.59 (95% CI: 1.09–2.32) when this group was compared with the 10 mm or more group (reference), with moderate between-study heterogeneity (I2 = 45.30%, P = 0.07). Commensurate results were identified by sensitivity analysis.Conclusion:The result of this meta-analysis suggests a long-term survival (overall survival) advantage for negative margins of 10 mm or more in comparison with negative margins less than 10 mm for patients undergoing surgical resection of ICC.

It remains unclear whether hepatectomy for colorectal liver metastasis (CRLM) should be performed as anatomical resection (AR) or nonanatomical resection (NAR). The aim of this study is to compare the short- and long-term outcomes of AR and NAR for CRLM. PubMed, Web of Science, EMBASE and the Cochrane Library were systematically searched to identify eligible studies. Twenty one studies involving 5207 patients were analyzed: 3034 (58.3%) underwent AR procedure and 2173 (41.7%) underwent NAR procedure. The results showed that overall survival (OS, hazard ratio (HR) 1.06, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.95–1.18) and disease free survival (DFS, HR 1.11, 95% CI 0.99–1.24) did not differ significantly between AR and NAR. Duration of operation, postoperative morbidity and mortality were higher in AR than in NAR. There were no significant differences in blood loss and prevalence rate of postoperative positive margins (OR 0.79, 95% CI 0.37–1.52). Our analysis shows that AR does not seem to bring more prognostic benefits than NAR for the treatment of CRLM, and does seem to be inferior to NAR in terms of duration of operation, incidence of postoperative morbidity and mortality.