3D printing technology has a promising prospect of medical use and clinical value, and may play an important role in the field of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery, such as preoperative diagnosis, surgical planning, surgical approach alternatives and organ replacement. This review focuses on the development of 3D printing technology in recent years and its use and prospect in the field of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery including surgical teaching and simulation, personalized prosthesis implantation, and artificial organ transplantation.
Currently,lung cancer (LC) has one of the highest incidence rates among various malignant tumors worldwide,and the annual mortality rate of LC has ranked first among all malignant tumors. About 80% of LC patients present to the hospital in a late advanced stage and lose the chance of surgical resection. Among all the patients who receive surgical treatment,the 5-year mortality rate of patients with early TNM stages is far lower than that of patients with advanced stage LC. With the advancement of medical equipment and more people who receive routine medical examination,more and more patients with small pulmonary nodules are discovered. Limited lung resection,including wedge resection and segmental resection,can be performed with minimally invasive video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery for these patients to acquire equivalent surgical outcomes as traditional lobectomy and a much better postoperative quality of life. LC screening increases the chances of early detection and diagnosis of LC patients,so these patients can receive reasonable diagnosis and treatment at an early stage. This strategy can greatly reduce treatment cost and mortality,and achieve maximal treatment benefits with minimal economic and medical cost. This review focuses on the necessity,high-risk groups,evaluation criteria and methods of LC screening with some LC screening guidelines and research studies in order to provide reasonable and feasible screening strategies and references for clinical LC screening.