CPA caused many lesions in the lungs that led to life-threatening conditions when complications such as hemoptysis occurred [18, 19]. Immediate treatment was critical for these cases, and surgery was the priority choice if the pulmonary function was not severely insufficiency [20]. Many studies had been carried out to confirm that surgical treatment (almost surgical resection) of pulmonary aspergilloma brought out many advantages such as preventing recurrent hemoptysis and excellent long-term results [2, 3, 8, 21]. Although modern technology using Robotic resection that got further advantages [22] but less invasive surgery such as sub-lobar resection and video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) was more preferred with good results just in patients, who had simple pulmonary aspergilloma [23-26].
Anti-fungal medication (voriconazole, itraconazole) was a safe and effective modality and should be considered if surgery contraindicated [27-29]. But in the case of both medical and surgical treatment were ineffective or contraindicated in massive hemoptysis due to aspergilloma, intervention treatment was an alternative therapy with the success rate was 40.0 % [30]. Among that, bronchial artery embolism could be considered when systemic embolism was ineffective or to reduce perioperative bleeding [20, 31, 32]. Another therapy such as bronchoscopic procedure and radiotherapy also was a potential option for selected cases [33, 34]. The remarkable result in our study was that the hemoptysis symptoms plunged statistically significant with no cases in the TE group and 2 cases in TTB group. The recurrence rate in 24 months was low, with just only one case in the TE group had hemoptysis, but its severity was lesser than before the operation.
In line with good results of hemoptysis control, Karnofsky score (Karnofsky performance status, Karnofsky Performance Scale) in this study showed statistically significant changes from time point to time point. It was a monitoring index used in peri-operative and post-operative lung transplantation [35, 36]. In our study, the almost pulmonary function of the patient was diminished. After surgery, there was no change in pulmonary function, but the Karnofsky score had significant changes that showed overall efficacy of surgery. The reason behind this may be that hemoptysis was serious sequela in CPA patients that plunged remarkably [20, 37].
In our study, although four patients died, there was no death related to surgery. The reasons for all deaths were a complication of co-morbidity diseases. Another study showed that the mortality rate was variants from one in 17 patients to 4 in nine patients. The reasons behind this may be that the number of patients was small, and the experience of the surgeon may be a lack in this type of surgery [12, 38]. In low-resource countries, surgery for CPA was very challenging, but it was the best treatment modality for symptomatic patients [39]. Lung resection was too invasive and not considered in high-risk patients. When resection was not feasible, alternative therapies, such as cavernostomy [13, 32], intracavitary Amphotericin-B [40] or bronchial artery occlusion [30] should be advised. Cavernostomy was a useful option for high-risk patients with many advantages [20, 41]. The results of our study re-confirmed the efficacy of cavernostomy and thoracoplasty surgery for CPA with hemoptysis.
One of the surgical characteristics was that the cavity formed after carvernostomy and the use of table tennis ball or tissue expander to compress the space and maintain the collapse. This is the difference between our study and other studies using myoplasty. In thoracoplasty, over the years many tissues and materials were tried as a filler, cavernostomy had been performed and showed useful such as single-stage using muscle transposition flap [15, 42], cavernostomy with limited thoracoplasty [15] and simplified cavernostomy involving Alexis Wound Protector [43]. Flap transposition has been approved as component of a multimodal treatment [44] with most used flaps were the latissimus dorsi and the serratus [45]. It permits achieving complete space obliteration [46] for well-selected patients, but in patients with large size cavity or multiple bronchopleural fistulae, it seemed to be ineffective[47]. In our study, the variety of pulmonary size combined with poor general condition seemed to be not suitable for myoplasty. Moreover, the remained space may leaded to recurrence. In our study, we performed single-stage cavernostomy, and thoracoplasty with the recurrence rate was low. This result was in line with Chen et al. [9]. According to our viewpoints, the critical elements of this technique to ensure the recurrence rate was low depended on the bronchial fistula and the cavity condition. The bronchial fistula must be closed that was checked by anesthesia through to expand the lung and no gas leakage if it closed. The cavity was disappeared with the compressed materials (both table tennis ball and tissue expander), losing environment that fungus can be developed.
One key point in our study was compressing materials. Each material has advantages on its own. The table tennis ball emerged as low-cost, easy to find anywhere, but because of the fixed size, it was difficult to manipulate when filled the space. Its complications included shortness of breath, bronchopleural fistula extrusion, superior vena cava obstruction, hemorrhage, pain [16]. There was a report showed that it still works after 46 years with uncomplicated outcome [48]. Tissue expander was used in this surgery as applicable methods. It has been recognized as a standard procedure in the United States for breast reconstruction [49]. Although it has a higher risk of reconstructive failure and surgical-site infection, this was the right choice for high-risk patients or unavailable for autologous reconstruction [50, 51]. This was the reason why we chose tissue expander because of its benefits. We can modify volume to keep fit and ensured that space was compressed appropriately. Several complications of tissue expander in breast reconstruction such as infection, hematoma/seroma, and explantation were reported [52], and there were differences among stages with stage I rather than the later stage [53]. In this study, we performed only one stage with low complications. The results indicate that tissue expander may become a potential material used in cavernostomy and thoracoplasty. The difference between TTB group and TE group was rib retraction. It was statistically significant higher in TE group. The reason behind this was that table tennis ball is fixed and we can add it one by one through appropriate incision but tissue expander is flexible, we need an incision with the same size to put it in the right place.