Indication and limit of salvage esophagectomy after definitive chemoradiotherapy for esophageal cancer

The recent increased use of definitive chemoradiotherapy suggests the potential need to perform a salvage esophagectomy because the presence of local persistent or recurrent disease is common after this treatment. In this study, we examined the outcome of patients who underwent salvage esophagectomy after definitive chemoradiotherapy and reviewed the indication and limit of salvage esophagectomy. Salvage esophagectomy could be the second-line treatment for local recurrence after definitive chemoradiotherapy, but local persistent case, salvage esophagectomy dose not seem to be useful because of the high operative risk and high frequency of postoperative recurrence. (author)