Crippa J, Grass F, Achilli P, et al. - Via retrospectively analyzing consecutive patients operated on from February 2005 to April 2018, risk factors for conversion were determined among patients with rectal cancer undergoing minimally invasive abdominal surgery. Researchers analyzed a total of 600 patients and identified an overall conversion rate of 9·2 %. Lower risk of conversion was evident in patients undergoing minimally invasive rectal cancer surgery in correlation to undergoing robotic surgery; this association was observed in both obese and non-obese patients. Relative to non-obese patients, obese patients experienced a threefold higher risk of conversion.