Role of laparoscopy in the staging of malignant disease

The staging of carcinoma is of paramount importance in planning treatment a pproaches for localized and advanced disease. It is imperative to identify accurately those patients with a potentially resectable, localized tumor an d those patients with advanced disease or distant metastases. Current preop erative staging modalities are consistently inaccurate, resulting in a disp arity between the results of preoperative investigations and findings at la parotomy. The combined benefits of staging laparoscopy and laparoscopic ult rasonography help dictate the selection of curative or palliative procedure s in the cancer patient.