To retrospectively analyze the surgical strategies for bilateral pulmonary multiple ground-glass nodules in our hospital, and to explore the best diagnosis and treatment strategy for this type of disease.

A retrospective review of surgical practices for 100 patients with bilateral pulmonary multiple ground-glass nodules in single center from February 2014 to June 2017 was carried out. According to different treatment strategies, the patients were divided into four groups: unilateral surgery – contralateral follow-up (SF group) ; unilateral surgery – chemotherapy – contralateral follow-up (SCF group) ; unilateral surgery – chemotherapy – contralateral surgery (SCS group) ; unilateral surgery – synchronous contralateral surgery (SS group) . The patient’s demographics, clinical characteristics, total medical costs, and satisfaction level were recorded and compared.

All patients underwent unilateral surgery at least. There was no significant difference in chest tube duration and postoperative hospital stay (P>0.05) ; however, the pain score of synchronous bilateral surgery were higher than that of unilateral surgery (P<0.05) . No recurrence occurred and no additional nodules discovered during the follow-up periods. The total medical costs in SCS group was the largest and the SF group was the smallest. In terms of satisfaction survey, SF group was the best and SCS group was the worst.

The bi-pulmonary multiple ground glass nodules were mostly diagnosed as multiple primary cancers in the clinical practices. Surgery based multidisciplinary team was of great importance in dealing with these nodules. The patient’s satisfaction was a useful tool that helps us make an appropriate surgical strategy.