RECENT TRENDS IN THE MANAGEMENT OF INCISIONAL HERNIA

Objective: To improve our Surgical techniques in the management of Incisional hernia in accordance with the recent trends.Material and Methods: This study was conducted in Surgical B Ward of Khyber Teaching Hospital Peshawar. All the operations were performed from January 2002 to June 2004. Each patient was then followed up for at least 2 years. A total of 36 patients were selected for mesh repair using recent techniques. Patients were divided into two groups. In group I, sixteen hernias were considered to be subjectively medium in size and were repaired using first technique. In group II, twenty hernias were considered to be large in size and repaired. A standard Proforma was designed for every patient noting intra-operative and post operative complications, post operative hospital stay and follow up etc.Results: Total 36 patients in which 20 females and 16 males with age from 18 to 60 were included in this study. There were no intra- operative complications. The main post- operative complications were wound infection (5.5%), seroma formation (11%) and haematoma formation (5.5%). The mean post operative hospital stay was 8 days. All the patients were followed up for at least two years. 2 patients had recurrence in group I (5.8%), while in group II no patient reported recurrence till the last day of follow up.Conclusions: We advocate these new methods of mesh repair because they have modest complications rate and low recurrence rate.