Commentary: Mesothelioma: The Guinness world record holder in thromboembolism

Our plain-English summary of Commentary: Mesothelioma: The Guinness world record holder in thromboembolism, by R.B. Cameron (The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, 2020).

The study

• Author: R.B. Cameron
• Journal: The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery
• Published: 2020;160(4):1074-1075
• Type of article: Editorial, Comment
• Cited by: 1 article, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

In plain English

This article is a short commentary, not an original study. The author discussed a study by DeLeon and colleagues of patients with malignant pleural mesothelioma who had surgery (pleurectomy, according to the title in the reference list). As the commentary describes it, that study checked patients for blood clots (thromboembolic events) with weekly vein ultrasound scans starting on postoperative day 7. The commentary reports that the DeLeon study found clots in 32.2% of patients (30 of 93), despite routine preventive measures. Of those 30 clots, 9 caused symptoms before the first scheduled scan and 17 more were found at the first scan on day 7, so 26 of 30 (86.7%) developed before day 7. The author also cited earlier studies reporting that mesothelioma raises clot risk to as high as 27.7%. The author argued that surgeons should look for clots earlier, saying screening scans could be justified within the first 3 to 5 days after surgery. The author also called for study of more effective prevention, possibly including preventive medication for a full 90 days. The commentary does not discuss asbestos exposure.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Commentary (opinion piece) on another study (DeLeon and colleagues); no original data
• Who was studied: No patients were studied directly. The commentary discusses DeLeon and colleagues' study of 93 patients with malignant pleural mesothelioma undergoing surgery (pleurectomy, per the reference title).
• Main results:
  • Method of the DeLeon study as described in the commentary: weekly postoperative venous duplex (ultrasound) scans starting on postoperative day 7.
  • In the DeLeon study (not this article), the overall incidence of thromboembolic events was 32.2% (30 of 93 patients).
  • According to the commentary, these events in the DeLeon study occurred despite routine preventive measures.
  • In the DeLeon study, 9 of the 30 events were symptomatic before the first surveillance scan.
  • In the DeLeon study, a further 17 of 30 (56.7%) events were detected at the first surveillance scan on day 7.
  • In total, 26 of 30 events (86.7%) in the DeLeon study developed before postoperative day 7.
  • Background cited from earlier studies (references 1 and 2), not this article: a mesothelioma diagnosis increases the risk of thromboembolic events to as high as 27.7%.
  • The author's proposal (opinion, not a finding): screening scans could be justified within the first 3 to 5 days after surgery.
  • The author's proposal (opinion, not a finding): preventive therapy may need to be extended from the inpatient period to a full 90 days after surgery.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that the risk of thromboembolic events in mesothelioma patients undergoing surgery is very high, and that more attention should go to early detection and treatment and, above all, to prevention.

Topics

The National Library of Medicine indexes this study under subjects our site covers: Lung cancer, Mesothelioma.

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Mesothelioma.

Related studies

• Routine surveillance for diagnosis of venous thromboembolism after pleurectomy for malignant pleural mesothelioma — L.E. De León, C.E. Bravo-Iñiguez, et al. (2020)
• Commentary: To scan or not to scan: No longer the question for mesothelioma patients after pleurectomy — E.A. David, S.M. Atay (2020)
• Commentary: Focused attention on proactive identification of deep venous thrombosis after pleurectomy/decortication for malignant pleural mesothelioma — S.S. Groth, R.T. Ripley, et al. (2020)
• Comparison of an Australian food-frequency questionnaire with diet records: implications for nutrition surveillance — G.L. Ambrosini, D. Mackerras, et al. (2003)
• Computational prediction of diagnosis and feature selection on mesothelioma patient health records — D. Chicco, C. Rovelli (2019)
• Enduring health effects of asbestos use in Belgian industries: a record-linked cohort study of cause-specific mortality (2001-2009) — L. Van den Borre, P. Deboosere (2015)

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