Prehabilitation reduces complications in digestive cancer surgeries.

A recent network meta-analysis evaluated prehabilitation strategies for patients undergoing digestive system cancer surgery. It involved 26 randomized controlled trials with 2042 patients, revealing significant benefits: a 1.12-day reduction in hospital stay and decreased postoperative complications by 29%. Exercise-based prehabilitation emerged as the top intervention, particularly for reducing complications and improving functional recovery, while multimodal approaches excelled in enhancing quality of life and addressing depressive symptoms. Individual patient factors should guide strategy selection.