Regional anaesthesia and analgesia: relationship to cancer recurrence and survival (immune system...)

open access

Editor's key points

• Considerable evidence suggests that anaesthesia can have both direct and indirect effects on cancer cell survival and metastasis.
• Small retrospective clinical trials suggest that regional anaesthesia is associated with improved survival in cancer surgery.
• Large randomized clinical trials comparing the effects of regional and general anaesthesia on long-term outcome after cancer surgery are necessary to guide clinical practice.