To evaluate the role of pancreas multidisciplinary team(MDT) clinic in the diagnosis of pancreatic diseases,patient compliance with MDT advice,and the impact of MDT on the postoperative survival of patients with pancreatic cancer.

The study included 927 patients(554 males,373 females,aged (58.1±13.3)years (range: 15 to 89 years)) that had visited the pancreas MDT clinic of Zhongshan Hospital from May 2015 to December 2021,and 677 patients(396 males, 281 females, aged (63.6±8.9)years(range: 32 to 95 years)) who underwent radical surgery and with pathologically confirmed pancreatic adenocarcinoma from January 2012 to December 2020,of whom 79 patients had attended the pancreas MDT. The clinical and pathological data were collected and analyzed retrospectively. Diseases were classified in accordance with 2010 WHO classification of tumors of the digestive system and usual clinical practices. The Kaplan-Meier method was used for drawing the survival curve and calculating the survival rate. The univariate analysis was done by Log-rank test and the multivariate analysis was done by COX proportional hazards model. Survival rates were compared using χ² test.

Among the 927 patients that had visited the MDT clinic,233 patients(25.1%) were referred due to undetermined diagnosis. A direct diagnosis was made in 109 cases (46.8%,109/233) by the MDT clinic, of which 98 were consistent with the final diagnosis,resulting in an accuracy of 89.9%(98/109). The direct diagnosis rate in the recent years(36.6%(41/112),from June 2019 to December 2021) decreased compared to that in the previous years(56.2%(68/121),from May 2015 to May 2019),yet the accuracy in the recent years(90.2%,37/41) was basically the same as before (89.7%,61/68). The rate of compliance of the entire cohort was 71.5%(663/927), with the compliance rate in the recent two and a half years(81.4%,338/415) remarkably higher than that in the previous four years(63.4%,325/512). Patients with pancreatic cancer that attended the MDT exhibited a trend toward longer median postoperative survival than patients that did not attend the MDT,but the difference was not statistically significant(35.2 months vs.30.2 months,P>0.05). The 1-year and 3-year survival rates of patients that attended the MDT were significanly higher than patients that did not attend the MDT(88.6% vs. 78.4%,P<0.05;32.9% vs. 21.9%,P<0.05,respectively),but the 5-year survival rate was not statistically different(7.6% vs. 4.8%,P>0.05).

The pancreas MDT clinic is an accurate and convenient way to diagnose intractable pancreatic diseases,and in the recent years the patients′ compliance rate with MDT advice has increased. Pancreatic cancer patients that have attended the MDT have higher 1-year and 3-year postoperative survival rates,but the long-term survival benefits of MDT still needs to be proved by clinical studies on a larger scale.

Pancreatic neoplasms; Diagnosis; Multidisciplinary team; Patient compliance; Survival