Role of endoscopic ultrasound in the treatment of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors: Lights and shadows of endoscopic ultrasound-guided radiofrequency ablation

Table 1 Studies of endoscopic ultrasound-guided radiofrequency ablation on functioning-pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors

Ref.	Year	Study design	Number of patients/F-pNET	Tumor Size (mean, mm)	Location	Follow-up (months)1	Clinical success (%)1	Adverse events	Recurrence
Lakhtakia et al[36]	2016	Case series	3/3	17.3	Head: 3	12	100	0
Waung et al[37]	2016	Case report	1/1	18	Head	10	100	0
Bas-Cutrina et al[38]	2017	Case report	1/1	10	Body	10	100	NR
Goyal et al[39]	2017	Case series	1/1	7.5	Body	NR	100	0
Thosani et al[40]	2018	Retrospective, multicenter	3/3	23	NR	5	100	Not specified2
de Mussy et al[41]	2018	Case report	1/1	12	Body	2	100	NR
Choi et al[18]	2018	Prospective, monocenter	1/1	12	Head	13	100	0
Saurabh et al[42]	2019	Case report	1/1	17	Head	6	100	NR
Oleinikov et al[22]	2019	Retrospective, multicenter	7/9	14.8	Head: 7; body: 2	9.7	100	0
Choi et al[23]	2020	Prospective	1/1	12	Head	NR	100	0	1 (at 19 months)
Borwn et al[43]	2020	Case report	1/1	18	Head	8	100	0
Jonica and Wagh[44]	2020	Case report	1/1	22	Body	6	100	0
Furnica et al[45]	2020	Retrospective, monocenter	4/4	12	Head: 2; body: 1; tail: 1	22	100	2 acute pancreatitis
Kluz et al[46]	2020	Case report	1/1	9	Head	NR	NR	0
Lakhtakia et al[47]	2020	Prospective, monocenter	10/13	11.5	NR	10-64	100	1 acute pancreatitis; 1 abdominal pain
de Nucci et al[30]	2020	Prospective, monocenter	5/5	12.8	Body: 3; tail: 2	12	100	0
Younis et al[25]	2022	Prospective, monocenter	1/1	8	Tail	7	100	NR
Rossi et al[32]	2023	Prospective, monocenter	3/3	16	Head: 3; body: 3; tail: 4	22	100	1 intra-procedural bleeding
Chang et al[48]	2022	Case report	1/1	12	Head	18	100	1 abdominal pain
Marx et al[34]	2022	Prospective, multicenter	7/7	13.3	Head: 1; body: 6	21	85.7	3 NR; 1 death
Figueiredo Ferreira et al[27]	2022	Prospective, multicenter	13/13	14.4	NR	12	100	Not specified2
Rizzatti et al[29]	2023	Prospective, multicenter	30/30	12.1	Head: 15; body: 10; tail: 5	12	100	NR
Gugger et al[49]	2023	Case report	1/1	9	Tail	10	100	0
Borrelli de Andreis et al[50]	2023	Retrospective, monocenter	10/10	11.9	Head: 3; body: 3; tail: 4	19.5	100	2 abdominal pain
Crinò et al[16]	2023	Retrospective, multicenter	89/89	13.4	Head: 34; body: 39; tail: 16	23	95.5	8 acute pancreatitis, 5 abdominal pain, 1 spleen hematoma, 1 diabetes	16.9% at 9.5 momths
Napoléon et al[17]	2023	Retrospective, multicenter	16/16	15	NR	13	87.5	Not specified2
Biermann et al[7]	2024	Case series	3/3	14	Head: 2; tail: 1	12.7	100	1 case of melena
Lesmana[28]	2024	Case series	3/3	27.7	Head: 2; body: 1	6-12	100	0
Okasha et al[19]	2025	Prospective, multicenter	11/11	17.4	Head: NR; body: NR; tail: NR	12 ± 12.3	90.9	4 acute pancreatitis

¹In case of multiple types of pancreatic lesions, the overall data were indicated.

²It was not possible to verify in which patients the reported adverse events occurred.

F-pNET: Functioning pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor; NR: Not reported.

Table 2 Studies of endoscopic ultrasound-guided radiofrequency ablation on non-functioning-pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors

Ref.	Year	Study design	Number of patients/NF-pNET	Tumor size (mean, mm)	Location	Follow-up (months)1	Radiologic response	Adverse events
Rossi et al[20]	2014	Prospective monocenter	1/1	9	Head	34	CR	NR
Armellini et al[51]	2015	Case report	1/1	20	Tail	NR	CR	0
Pai et al[6]	2015	Prospective, multicenter	2/2	27.5	Head; body	3-6	NR	0
Choi et al[18,23]	2018, 2020	Prospective, monocenter	13/13	18.1	Head: 5; body: 7; tail: 1	28	CR: 9/13 (69.2%); PR: 3/13 (23.1%); NoR: 1/13 (7.7%)	Not specified2
Oleinikov et al[22]	2019	Retrospective, multicenter	11/16	14.2	Head: 8; body: 6; tail: 2	8.9	CR: 8/11 (72.2%); PR: 1/11 (9.1%); 2 missing data	2 acute pancreatitis
Barthet et al[21,26]	2021, 2019	Prospective, multicenter	12/14	13.4	Head: 3; body: 6; tail: 5	45.6	CR: 12/14; (85.7%); NoR: 2/14 (14.3%)	Not specified2; 1 late recurrence
de Nucci et al[30]	2020	Prospective, monocenter	5/6	16	Head: 3; body: 2; tail: 2	12	CR: 5/5 (100%)	2 abdominal pain
Lesmana[28]	2024	Case report	1/1	35	Head	36	CR only of the solid part, no CR of the cystic part	0
Younis et al[25]	2022	Prospective, monocenter	6/6	8.9	Head: 2; body: 4	7	CR: 4/6 (66.7%); NoR: 2/6 (33.3%)	Not specified2
Marx et al[34]	2022	Prospective, multicenter	27/27	14	Head: 8; body: 8; tail: 11	15.7	CR: 25/27 (92.6%); NoR: 2/27 (7.4%)	4 acute pancreatitis
Figueiredo Ferreira et al[27]	2022	Prospective, multicenter	9/10	14.4	NR	9.6	CR: 6/11 (54.6%); PR: 3/11 (27.2%); NoR: 2/11 (18.2%); F-pNETs + NF-pNETs	Not specified2
Rizzatti et al[29]	2023	Prospective, multicenter	32/32	16.8	Head: 8; body: 15; tail: 9	12	CR: 24/24 (100%); 8 missing data	Not specified2
Napoléon et al[17]	2023	Retrospective, multicenter	NR/48	15	NR	13	CR: 33/48 (71.7%); PR: 12/48 (26.1%); NoR: 1/48 (2.2%); 2 missing data	Not specified2

¹In case of multiple types of pancreatic lesions, the overall data were indicated.

²It was not possible to verify in which patients the reported adverse events occurred.

NF-pNET: Nonfunctioning pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor; CR: Complete response; PR: Partial response; NoR: No response; F-pNET: Functioning pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor; NR: Not reported.