To establish recommendations for optimisation of the management of patients undergoing pulmonary lobectomy, particularly Enhanced Recovery After Surgery (ERAS).

A consensus committee of 13 experts from the French Society of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Medicine (Société française d’anesthésie et de réanimation, SFAR) and the French Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery (Société française de chirurgie thoracique et cardiovasculaire, SFCTCV) was convened. A formal conflict-of-interest policy was developed at the onset of the process and enforced throughout. The entire guidelines process was conducted independently of any industry funding. The authors were advised to follow the principles of the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) system to guide assessment of quality of evidence.

Five domains were defined: 1) patient pathway and patient information; 2) preoperative management and rehabilitation; 3) anaesthesia and analgesia for lobectomy; 4) surgical strategy for lobectomy; and 5) enhanced recovery after surgery. For each domain, the objective of the recommendations was to address a number of questions formulated according to the PICO model (Population, Intervention, Comparison, Outcome). An extensive literature search on these questions was carried out and analysed using the GRADE® methodology. Recommendations were formulated according to the GRADE® methodology, and were then voted by all experts according to the GRADE grid method.

The SFAR/SFCTCV guideline panel provided 32 recommendations on the management of patients undergoing pulmonary lobectomy. After two voting rounds and several amendments, a strong consensus was reached for 31 of the 32 recommendations and a moderate consensus was reached for the last recommendation. Seven of these recommendations present a high level of evidence (GRADE 1+), 23 have a moderate level of evidence (18 GRADE 2+ and 5 GRADE 2-), and 2 correspond to expert opinions. Finally, no recommendation was provided for 2 of the questions.

A strong consensus was expressed by the experts to provide recommendations to optimise the whole perioperative management of patients undergoing pulmonary lobectomy.