TY - JOUR T1 - Clinical outcome in relation to timing of surgery in chronic pancreatitis: A nomogram to predict pain relief AU - Ali U, Nieuwenhuijs VB, van Eijck CH, et al Y1 - 2012/10/01 N1 - 10.1001/archsurg.2012.1094 JO - Archives of Surgery SP - 925 EP - 932 VL - 147 IS - 10 N2 - Objective  To evaluate the effect of timing of surgery on the long-term clinical outcome of surgery in chronic pancreatitis (CP).Design  Cohort study with long-term follow-up.Setting  Five specialized academic centers.Patients  Patients with CP treated surgically for pain.Interventions  Pancreatic resection and drainage procedures for pain relief.Main Outcome Measures  Pain relief (pain visual analogue score ≤4), pancreatic function, and quality of life.Results  We included 266 patients with median follow-up of 62 months (interquartile range, 31-112). Results were presented as odds ratios (ORs)with 95% confidence intervals after correction for bias using bootstrap-corrected analysis. Pain relief was achieved in 149 patients (58%). Surgery within 3 years of symptoms was independently associated with more pain relief (OR, 1.8; 95% CI, 1.0-3.4; P = .03) and less endocrine pancreatic insufficiency (OR, 0.57; 95% CI, 0.33-0.96; P = .04). More pain relief was also observed in patients not taking opioids preoperatively (OR, 2.1; 95% CI, 1.2-4.0; P = .006) and who had 5 or fewer endoscopic treatments prior to surgery (OR, 2.5; 95% CI, 1.1-6.3; P = .04). The probability of achieving pain relief varied between 23% and 75%, depending on these risk factors.Conclusions  The timing of surgery is an important risk factor for clinical outcome in CP. Surgery may need to be considered at an earlier phase than it is now, preferably within 3 years of symptomatic CP. Likelihood of postoperative pain relief can be calculated on an individual basis using the presented nomogram. SN - 0004-0010 M3 - doi: 10.1001/archsurg.2012.1094 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/archsurg.2012.1094 ER -