Evaluation of Healthcare Workers Safety During Pressurized Intraperitoneal Aerosol Chemotherapy (PIPAC-Secure)

Peritoneal carcinomatosis (PC), which was long considered as a terminal stage, is now potentially curable. Nevertheless, in most cases, the surgical treatment of PC is limited by the disease extent which is commonly measured with the Peritoneal Carcinomatosis Index (PCI). For the patients that are not considered good candidates for resection, there are very few alternatives. Systemic chemotherapy may have limited or no effect therefore an alternative solution is needed for these patients.

Pressurized intraperitoneal aerosol chemotherapy (PIPAC) is a new treatment that applies chemotherapeutic drugs into the peritoneal cavity as an aerosol under pressure through minimal laparoscopic surgery.

Nevertheless, as it is the case for most technologies, security is not always completely tested. The innovative team started by establishing a set of security rules that concern the operating room ventilation, distance monitoring of the patient during nebulization, evacuation of the aerosols in a closed system. In a work dedicated to occupational hazards, the authors followed the following steps: identification of hazardous substances and dose; identification of possible exposure ways; simulation of the PIPAC procedure with nontoxic aerosols and smoke; redaction of standard operating procedures (SOP); second simulation according to the SOP; informing and training the health care workers; and performance of the first two PIPAC procedures with chemotherapeutic substances and workplace measurements under real conditions. At the end of the study, there were no traces of doxorubicin or cisplatin (the two drugs used in the two consecutive test procedures) in the operating room air, neither to the position of the anesthesiologist, nor of the surgeon.

This study does not concern PIPAC with oxaliplatin, nor does it research the presence of the drugs in the health caregivers.

Therefore we considered mandatory to further investigate occupational hazards in the specific case of oxaliplatin by focusing more on the healthcare workers and partially applying the same protocols as in the case of Heated intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC).