Surgery (Austin & Northern Health) - Research Publications

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    A systematic review and meta-analysis of the long-term outcomes of ileal conduit and orthotopic neobladder urinary diversion
    Browne, E ; Lawrentschuk, N ; Jack, GS ; Davis, NF (CANADIAN UROLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, 2021-01)
    INTRODUCTION: We aimed to perform a systematic review and meta-analysis on the long-term durability, incidence of complications, and patient satisfaction outcomes in ileal conduit (IC) and orthotopic neobladder (ONB). METHODS: A systematic electronic literature search was performed in Medline, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Scopus using MeSH and free-text search terms "Urinary diversion" AND "Ileal conduit" AND "Neobladder." The search concluded June 19, 2018. Inclusion criteria were those patients who had a cystectomy and required urinary diversion by either IC or neobladder. RESULTS: In total, 32 publications met the inclusion criteria. Data were available on 46 787 patients (n=36 719 for IC and n=10 068 for ONB). Meta-analyses showed that IC urinary diversions performed less favorably than ONB in terms of re-operation rates, Clavien-Dindo complications, and mortality rates; odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were 1.76 (1.24, 2.50), p<0.01; 1.16 (1.09, 1.22), p<0.01; and 6.29 (5.30, 7.48), p<0.01, respectively. IC urinary diversion performed better than ONB in relation to urinary tract infection rates and ureteric stricture rates, OR and 95% CI 0.67 (0.58, 0.77), p<0.01; and 0.70 (0.55, 0.89), p<0.01, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our results show that there is no significantly increased morbidity with ONB compared to IC. Selection of either urinary diversion technique should be based on factors such as tumor stage, comorbidities, surgical experience, and patient acceptance of postoperative sequalae.
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    Oxytocin receptor antagonists as a novel pharmacological agent for reducing smooth muscle tone in the human prostate
    Lee, SN ; Kraska, J ; Papargiris, M ; Teng, L ; Niranjan, B ; Hammar, J ; Ryan, A ; Frydenberg, M ; Lawrentschuk, N ; Middendorff, R ; Ellem, SJ ; Whittaker, M ; Risbridger, GP ; Exintaris, B (NATURE PORTFOLIO, 2021-03-18)
    Pharmacotherapies for the treatment of Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) are targeted at reducing cellular proliferation (static component) or reducing smooth muscle tone (dynamic component), but response is unpredictable and many patients fail to respond. An impediment to identifying novel pharmacotherapies is the incomplete understanding of paracrine signalling. Oxytocin has been highlighted as a potential paracrine mediator of BPH. To better understand oxytocin signalling, we investigated the effects of exogenous oxytocin on both stromal cell proliferation, and inherent spontaneous prostate contractions using primary models derived from human prostate tissue. We show that the Oxytocin Receptor (OXTR) is widely expressed in the human prostate, and co-localises to contractile cells within the prostate stroma. Exogenous oxytocin did not modulate prostatic fibroblast proliferation, but did significantly (p < 0.05) upregulate the frequency of spontaneous contractions in prostate tissue, indicating a role in generating smooth muscle tone. Application of atosiban, an OXTR antagonist, significantly (p < 0.05) reduced spontaneous contractions. Individual tissue responsiveness to both exogenous oxytocin (R2 = 0.697, p < 0.01) and atosiban (R2 = 0.472, p < 0.05) was greater in tissue collected from older men. Overall, our data suggest that oxytocin is a key regulator of inherent spontaneous prostate contractions, and targeting of the OXTR and associated downstream signalling is an attractive prospect in the development of novel BPH pharmacotherapies.
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    Cancer in Lockdown: Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Patients with Cancer
    Moraliyage, H ; De Silva, D ; Ranasinghe, W ; Adikari, A ; Alahakoon, D ; Prasad, R ; Lawrentschuk, N ; Bolton, D (WILEY, 2021-02)
    The lockdown measures of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic have disengaged patients with cancer from formal health care settings, leading to an increased use of social media platforms to address unmet needs and expectations. Although remote health technologies have addressed some of the medical needs, the emotional and mental well-being of these patients remain underexplored and underreported. We used a validated artificial intelligence framework to conduct a comprehensive real-time analysis of two data sets of 2,469,822 tweets and 21,800 discussions by patients with cancer during this pandemic. Lung and breast cancer are most prominently discussed, and the most concerns were expressed regarding delayed diagnosis, cancellations, missed treatments, and weakened immunity. All patients expressed significant negative sentiment, with fear being the predominant emotion. Even as some lockdown measures ease, it is crucial that patients with cancer are engaged using social media platforms for real-time identification of issues and the provision of informational and emotional support.
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    Scoping review: hotspots for COVID-19 urological research: what is being published and from where?
    Qu, LG ; Perera, M ; Lawrentschuk, N ; Umbas, R ; Klotz, L (SPRINGER, 2021-09)
    PURPOSE: Contemporary, original research should be utilised to inform guidelines in urology relating to the COVID-19 pandemic. This comprehensive review aimed to: identify all up-to-date original publications relating to urology and COVID-19, characterise where publications were from, and outline what topics were investigated. METHODS: This review utilised a search strategy that assessed five electronic databases, additional grey literature, and global trial registries. All current published, in-press, and pre-print manuscripts were included. Eligible studies were required to be original research articles of any study design, reporting on COVID-19 or urology, in any of study population, intervention, comparison, or outcomes. Included studies were reported in a narrative synthesis format. Data were summarised according to primary reported outcome topic. A world heatmap was generated to represent where included studies originated from. RESULTS: Of the 6617 search results, 48 studies met final inclusion criteria, including 8 pre-prints and 7 ongoing studies from online registries. These studies originated from ten countries according to first author affiliation. Most studies originated from China (n = 13), followed by Italy (n = 12) and USA (n = 11). Topics of the study included pathophysiological, administrative, and clinical fields: translational (n = 14), COVID-19-related outcomes (n = 5), urology training (n = 4), telemedicine (n = 7), equipment and safety (n = 2), urology in general (n = 4), uro-oncology (n = 3), urolithiasis (n = 1), and kidney transplantation (n = 8). CONCLUSION: This review has outlined available original research relevant to COVID-19 and urology from the international community. This summary may serve as a guide for future research priorities in this area.
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    Clinical trials in urological oncology: COVID-19 and the potential need for a new perspective
    Teh, J ; O'Connor, E ; Coles-Black, J ; Lawrentschuk, N (SPRINGER, 2021-09)
    The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the suspension, termination or alteration of thousands of clinical trials as the health emergency escalated globally. Whilst the rapid suspension of certain clinical trials was necessary to ensure the safety of high-risk or vulnerable trial participants as well as healthcare workers, the long-term ramifications that this delay will have on the field of urologic oncology is unknown. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need to plan for and implement new strategies to advance our understanding of unmet areas of need in urologic oncology. The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the suspension, termination or alteration of thousands of clinical trials as the health emergency escalated globally. Whilst the rapid suspension of certain clinical trials was necessary to ensure the safety of high-risk or vulnerable trial participants as well as healthcare workers, the long-term ramifications that this delay will have on the field of urologic oncology is unknown. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need to plan for and implement new strategies to advance our understanding of unmet areas of need in urologic oncology.
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    Case series - Peritoneal and port-site metastasis following robotic-assisted radical prostatectomy
    O'Connor, E ; Timm, B ; Chislett, B ; Teh, J ; Lawrentschuk, N ; Murphy, DG ; Bolton, D (CANADIAN UROLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, 2021-01)
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    Patterns of primary staging for newly diagnosed prostate cancer in the era of prostate specific membrane antigen positron emission tomography: A population-based analysis
    Papa, N ; Perera, M ; Murphy, DG ; Lawrentschuk, N ; Evans, M ; Millar, JL ; Bolton, D (WILEY, 2021-10)
    INTRODUCTION: There has been a growing body of evidence highlighting the improved sensitivity and specificity for prostate specific membrane antigen (PSMA) positron emission tomography (PET) in advanced prostate cancer imaging. We aimed to assess prostate cancer staging practice patterns in Australia using population-based data. SUBJECT AND METHODS: We extracted data on men diagnosed with prostate cancer between October 2016 and December 2018 from the Prostate Cancer Outcomes Registry-Victoria (PCOR-Vic). We evaluated trends and comparisons between patients receiving PET/CT (with or without conventional imaging (CImg)), and CImg alone, and analysed imaging modality as predictor of clinical regional node positive disease (cN1 vs cN0/X), metastatic disease (cM1 vs cM0/X), and treatment received. RESULTS: In total, 6139 patients in the registry had either a staging PET scan (n = 889, 14%), CImg without PET scan (n = 2464, 40%), or no recorded PET or CImg (n = 2786, 45%). The proportion of allimaged patients who received staging PET increased from 19% to 36% from the first to last three-month period, and in the high-risk category the increase was 23-43%. After adjustment for grade group, PET vs CImg-only patients were observed to have a higher proportion of cN1 disease (OR = 2.46, 95% CI: 1.90-3.20) but not cM1 disease (OR = 1.10, 95% CI: 0.84-1.44). CONCLUSIONS: Our registry data highlights the rapid uptake of PET imaging, particularly in high-risk disease. Based on this data, we highlight the increased diagnosis of nodal disease, thus potentially optimizing patient selection prior to definitive treatment for prostate cancer.