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Background: The Blake drain (BD) has recently begun to be used as a chest tube after pulmonary resection; however, its fluid drainage and air evacuation characteristics remain unclear. We compared the performance of the 19F BD with that of the 32F conventional drain (CD)., Methods: We studied 148 consecutive patients (74 with BD; 74 with CD) who underwent pulmonary resection. Postoperative drainage rates (daily drainage and total drainage) were analyzed to assess fluid drainage. Air evacuation was evaluated to determine whether subcutaneous emphysema or insufficient residual lung expansion developed when air leakage occurred. The BD group was initially managed with water seal or suction, whereas the CD group was managed with water seal. Furthermore, we experimentally measured the evacuation pressure required to expel a constant volume of air through various chest tubes to determine basic air evaluation performance of the tubes., Results: Drainage rates on the operative day were significantly lower in the BD group than in the CD group, but were similar in both groups on the following day with greater variation in the water-sealed BD group. Among cases with air leakage, air evacuation insufficiency was more frequent in the BD group (16 of 22, 73%) than in the CD group (4 of 17, 24%; p = 0.004). The experiment revealed that air evacuation performance of the 19F BD was equivalent to that of the 12F CD, indicating that the BD requires higher intrathoracic pressure for air evacuation., Conclusions: Suction is required for the BD to obtain fluid drainage performance comparable to that of the water-sealed CD. When air leakage occurs, air evacuation by the BD tends to be insufficient, irrespective of suction conditions.

Background: Lung cancer staging system proposed in 2007 adopts detailed tumor size cut-off values. Alternatively, visceral pleural invasion is deemed an important prognosticator, but has not been easily incorporated into the staging system., Methods: We studied 1,245 patients with resected nonsmall-cell lung cancer. Among patients with current pathologic stage IB (pT2N0M0) disease, those with worse prognosis were reclassified as stage IIA based on tumor size and degree of visceral pleural invasion defined by the Japan Lung Cancer Society: P0 = no pleural involvement beyond elastic layer; P1 = infiltration beyond elastic layer without exposure to pleural surface; and P2 = exposure to pleural surface., Results: The current pT2 category was divided into five groups based on size ( 3 to 5 cm) and degree of visceral pleural invasion (P0-1 or P2). Five-year survival rates in patients with P0-1 tumors greater than 3 cm to 5 cm or less were significantly better (59.5%) than those with tumors greater than 5 cm or P2 tumors (37.5% to 47.3%; p = 0.0014); we defined these two groups as T2a and T2b, respectively, and classified T2aN0M0 as stage IB and T2bN0M0 as stage IIA together with the current T1N1M0. Five-year survival rates for the modified IB and IIA diseases were 70.6% and 60.4%, respectively (p = 0.0414)., Conclusions: Modified subcategorization of the pT2 category resulted in T2a (> 3 to 5 cm or P2). Detailed assessment of the degree of visceral pleural invasion could provide more information on tumor characteristics and complement the pathologic staging of lung cancer.

Background: Although the prognoses of patients with resectable lung cancer involving neighboring structures vary, the current tumor-nodes-metastasis (TNM) classification system does not elucidate criteria for tumor subcategorization., Methods: We studied 196 consecutive patients who underwent resection of non-small cell lung cancer involving neighboring structures at the Aichi Cancer Center Hospital and were diagnosed as pathologic T3 diseases using the current staging system. Tumors were divided into six groups based on the involved neighboring structures: parietal or mediastinal pleura, subpleural soft tissue, ribs, main bronchus, pericardium, and diaphragm., Results: The overall 5-year survival rate was 39.8%. The survival rates for the six groups were: pleura (n = 62), 54.8%; subpleural soft tissue (n = 50), 30.0%; rib (n = 25), 24.0%; main bronchus (n = 33), 48.5%; pericardium (n = 14), 21.4%; and diaphragm (n = 12), 33.3%. The combined pleura and bronchus groups (n = 95) demonstrated significantly better survival outcome than the other groups (n = 101): 52.6% and 27.7%, respectively (p = 0.0002). Furthermore, among 108 patients with pT3N0 (stage IIB) disease, the prognostic difference between the pleura and bronchus groups (n = 50) and the other groups (n = 58) was significant: 64.0% and 25.9%, respectively (p < 0.0001). Similar results were confirmed in patients with complete resection (n = 159)., Conclusions: Subcategorization of resectable lung cancer involving neighboring structures resulted in tumor groups infiltrating pleura or main bronchus, and those involving subpleural structures, pericardium, or diaphragm.