Objective  The clinical factors of single-port video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (SP-VATS) were compared with those of multi-port video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (MP-VATS). The differences between the two surgical methods and their respective postoperative recoveries were also discussed.

  Methods  A total of 522 patients who underwent surgical treatment for lung cancer in Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institate and Hospital from January, 2014 to December, 2015 were retrospectively reviewed. Of these cases, 83 underwent SP-VATS and 439 underwent MP-VATS. The two surgical methods were then compared in terms of operative time, operative bleeding, number of lymph node and lymph node cleaning station, pain degree, 24 h postoperative chest drainage, and in-hospital time after operation.

  Results  The differences between the patients who underwent SP-VATs and those who underwent MP-VATS in term of gender, age, smoking, tumor diameter, TNM stage, pathological type, and tumor location were not statistically significant. The operative time in SP-VATS group was longer than that in the MP-VATS group (P < 0.01), whereas in-hospital time after operation in the former group was shorter than that in the latter (P=0.011). Furthermore, pain degree in the SP-VATS group is lower than that in the MP-VATS group (P=0.041). The differences between the two groups in terms of operative bleeding, number of lymph node and lymph node cleaning station, and 24 h postoperative chest drainage were not statistically significant.

  Conclusion  SP-VATS can achieve a surgical effect similar to that of MP-VATS but has a prolonged operation time. SP-VATS is beneficial to postoperative recovery and reduces the degree of pain. Thus, it has great potential for development.