Recent experience with cancer of the ampulla of Vater in a national hospital group.

A total of 64 resections, 24 operative bypasses and 35 nonoperative biliary intubations, were performed for ampullary carcinoma in U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs hospitals from 1987 to 1991. Mean survival after resection was 702 days, significantly higher (ANOVA, P < or = 0.005) than that after bypass (345 days) or intubation (385 days). Operative mortality rates were similar: resection or intubation = 14%, bypass = 12%. Operative (30-day) mortality was zero in four local resections, 10% in 51 Whipples and 44% in nine total pancreatectomies. TNM staging was available for 74 patients, and mean survival after resection exceeded 2 years in 34 patients with Stage I-II (localized) cancers, was 532 days in 10 patients with Stage III (regional nodes +) and 77 days in two patients with Stage IV (metastatic) disease. However, mean survival without resection was 498 days in 14 patients with localized cancer, 634 days in two patients with regional and 215 days in 11 patients with distant metastases. Resection clearly increased survival only for Stage I cancers (P < or = 0.02). Predicted 5-year survival rates by stage after resection were: I-II = 21%, III < 10%, IV = 0%. Complications were recorded in 29 per cent of resected patients, with sepsis the most common (21% of resections). Both sepsis and GI bleeding significantly decreased mean survival (P < or = 0.05, ANOVA), but pneumonia, pancreatic fistula, or wound problems did not. Ampullary cancer is a favorable subtype of peri-ampullary cancers, but prolonged survival is also seen without resection and may be largely limited to tumors that do not involve regional nodes.