In nine comparative studies of minimally invasive esophagectomy for esophageal cancer, uniportal VATS was associated with less pneumonia and a shorter stay than multiportal VATS—but the evidence is not strong enough to establish a preferred approach.
- Pneumonia odds were lower with uniportal VATS (OR 0.41); hospital stay was shorter by about 2.1 days.
- Anastomotic leak, overall complications, recurrent laryngeal nerve injury, and perioperative mortality did not differ significantly.
Most studies were observational, and results for length of stay were highly heterogeneous. The findings are promising, not practice-changing.
Review by Amin F, Fatima R (…) Htun SH et 7 al. in J Gastrointest Cancer
© 2026. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.