Surgical treatment of gastrinomas: a single-centre experience.

Background: Gastrinomas are rare neuroendocrine tumours, and responsible for Zollinger-Ellison syndrome (ZES). Surgery is the only treatment that can cure gastrinomas. The success of surgical treatment of gastrinomas in a single centre was evaluated.

Methods: A retrospective review of all patients who underwent resection for a gastrinoma between 1992 and 2011 at a single institution was performed. Presentation, diagnostics, operative management and outcome were analysed.

Results: Eleven patients with a median age of 46 years were included. All patients had fasting hypergastrinaemia and a primary tumour was localized using imaging studies in all patients. A pylorus-preserving pancreaticoduodenectomy was performed in three patients: two patients underwent duodenectomy and one patient central pancreatectomy. The remaining five patients underwent enucleation. A primary tumour was removed in nine patients: five tumours were situated in the pancreas, three in the duodenum and one patient was considered to have a primary lymph node gastrinoma. The median follow-up was 3 years (range 1-15) after which 7 patients were disease-free and 3 patients had (suspected) metastatic disease. One patient died 13 years after initial surgery.

Conclusion: The success of surgical treatment of a gastrinoma in this series was 7/11 with a median follow-up of 3 years; comparable to recent published studies.