ASSESSMENT OF RECURRENT COLORECTAL CANCER FOR AVOIDING UNNECESSARY REOPERATION

Background : Eighty percent of patients who have recurrences after curative resection of their colo-rectal cancer do so within 2 years. Therefore follow up evaluations should be more frequent in this time mainly preoperative laparoscopic evaluation for the recurrent colorectal cancer if it in resectable or non- resectable to avoid unrecossary reoperation. Purpose: the purpose of this study is to evaluate the role of different diagnostic modalities in cases of recurrent colorectal cancer for a voiding unnecessary reoperation. Methods: Over a period of 2.5 years from January 2011 to July 2013, a total of 197 patients were the target of this study, 165 patients (group A) were analyzed reterospectively and 32 patients (group B) were collected prospectively in Al- Zahraa University Hospital. These patients with colorectal malignancy for whome curative operative resections were attempted during laparotomy and they are presented with clinical picture suggestive of recurrence of colorectal cancer within 1-5 years from this operation. Result: The sensitivity of the preoperative investigations to exclude unnecessary re-exploration for patients with colorectal cancer recurrence = 91% and specificity = 68%. If adding pre- exploratory laparoscopic to the pre-operative investigations the sensitivity increase to 97% and specificity to 94%. Conclusion: Our study strongly