Gastrointestinal cancer surgery in patients with a prior ventriculoperitoneal shunt: the department of veterans affairs experience.

Background: The estimated prevalence of hydrocephalus in all age groups is between 1% and 1.5%. Placement of a ventriculoperitoneal (VP) shunt in such patients offers them relatively normal lives. There are minimal data concerning the risk of postoperative complications in patients with shunts who undergo subsequent major visceral operations. We hypothesized that healthy adults who had VP shunts placed for acquired conditions and later underwent surgery for gastric or colon cancer would frequently have dense, shunt-related adhesions and high rates of adverse outcomes, particularly infection.

Methods: We assumed that all veterans were healthy on entry into military service. We searched national Department of Veterans Affairs databases from October 1994 through September 2003 to identify all Department of Veterans Affairs patients with shunts for acquired conditions and a curative-intent operation for stomach or colon cancer. We conducted chart reviews to determine their clinical courses.

Results: Five patients had codes for VP shunt, gastric cancer, and gastrectomy; 3 met our inclusion criteria. Fourteen had codes for VP shunt, colon cancer, and colectomy; 4 met our criteria. One of the evaluable gastrectomy patients had dense, shunt-related adhesions. None of the colectomy patients had notable adhesions. There were no postoperative complications in any of the seven patients.

Conclusion: We believe this is the first report analyzing the clinical course of adults with VP shunts who later had major abdominal cancer surgery. The presence of a shunt was associated with dense adhesions in 1 (14%) of the 7 patients in this series, but not with an increased risk of postoperative complications.