Background
leaks, air leak
THORACIC, STS
A postoperative air leak is defined by air scaping from the lung parenchyma to the pleural space after any kind of chest surgery. Although the incidence of any kind of air leak has been reported in around half of lung resection patients, the majority of these leaks ceases within few hours or days and air leak rates decrease to 5–20% by postoperative day 5 (excluding lung volume reduction surgery) [Air leaks that persist for longer than 5 days are reported and collected in the European Society of Thoracic Surgeons (ESTS) Database and in the Society of Thoracic Surgery (STS) Database, and this 5-day duration is commonly considered as the threshold for the definition of a prolonged air leak (PAL) after thoracic surgery. According to the last data reported in the ESTS Database Silver Book, the incidence of PAL following lobectomy is 9.4%, reaching 22.5% in lung volume reduction surgery [PALs are a burden to the healthcare system due to the associated increase in patient length of stay (LOS) and the cost of that LOS and of various necessary interventions [Several studies have identified risk factors for PAL [As a result of the existing evidence on the deleterious consequences of PAL and the identification of risk factors, several measures have been described to prevent postoperative air leak following lung surgery. These measures include both surgical techniques such as the “pleural tent” [There are reports of preclinical data on the effects of human adipose-derived stem cells on regeneration of damaged visceral pleural mesothelial cells on animal models [The aim of this work was to assess the feasibility and safety of the use of autologous BM-derived MSCs embedded in a Tissucol Duo