the effect of para aortic lymph node dissection in staging and complete cytoreductive surgery of ovarian cancer

Objective: lymphatic spread is a common feature of ovarian cancer both in early and advanced stages of the disease. there is also a controversial problem of the impact of para-aortic lymph node dissection between gynecologist oncologist experts. the aim of this study is evaluating the effect of para aortic lymph node dissection in ovarian cancer patients. methods: this descriptive cross-sectional study was performed on 100 ovarian cancer patients admitted in department of gynecology oncology of ghaem hospital, mashhad university of medical sciences, iran, from november 2013 - 2014. all patients underwent surgical staging surgery and optimal debulking surgery as possible. in addition, concurrent systematic pelvic and para-aortic lymphadenectomy up to the level of inferior mesenteric artery was performed. results: a total of 100 patients were studied. the mean age was 47 years (sd = 13). in 73 patients optimal cytoreductive surgery was done with para aortic lymphadenectomy. 53 cases (72.6%) were in primary cytoreductive surgery and 20 cases (27.3%) in interval debulking surgery groups. positive paraaortic lymph node in the first group was 6 cases (11.3) and in the second group was 2 cases (10%). 27 patients were in apparent stage i and 46 patients were in stage ii-iii-iv of disease. we found positive paraaortic lymph node in 11% of total patients. we found positive paraaortic lymph node without positive pelvic lymph node in two patients. conclusions: lymph node dissection will produce a significant benefit in accurate and complete surgical staging; it will reduce residual disease and then progression-free survival.