[Evaluation of lymph node metastasis in the contralateral mediastinum or scalene through mediastinoscopy and para-mediastinal small incision in potentially operable non-small cell lung cancer].

Objective The purpose of this study was to investigate the clinical characteristics of lymph node metastasis in the contralateral mediastinum and scalene in patients with potentially operable non- small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).Methods Cervical mediastinoscopy was performed for 89 patients with clinical stageⅠ～ⅢA non-small cell lung cancer prior to thoracotomy.Of these,12 underwent cervical medistinoscopy combined with right scalene lymph node biopsy and 10 with anterior para-mediastinal small incision.Results A total of 9 patients were found have N3 disease on mediastinosopy,with cancer-cell- positive lymph nodes in the contralateral mediastinum in 6 and 3 in the right scalene.Statistical analysis revealed that the incidence of N3 disease in adenocarcinoma group was higher than that in patients with non- adenocarcinoma(P0.05),which was also higher in the patients with serum CEA5 ng/ml than that in the patients with CEA5 ng/ml(P0.05),and it was higher in the patients with ipsilateral mediastinal multi-station lymph node metastasis than that in the patients with uni-station lymph node metastasis (P0.05).Conclusion Biopsy of contralateral mediastinal lymph nodes or scalene lymph node should be performed in order to exclude N3 disease for potentially operable NSCLC patients with adenocarcinoma, serum CEA5 ng/ml or ipsilateral multi-station mediastinal lymph node metastasis.