MONDAY, Aug. 28 (HealthDay News) -- Subclinical inguinal hernias may predict the development of radical prostatectomy-related inguinal hernia (RPRIH) within a year of undergoing surgery, and patients with these subclinical hernias should undergo hernia repair surgery during prostatectomy, according to research in the August issue of Urology.
Fumimasa Fukuta, M.D., of Sunagawa City Medical Center in Hokkaido, Japan, and colleagues reviewed the medical charts of 98 patients who underwent retropubic radical prostatectomy from January 2002 to December 2004. Patients were followed for an average of 17 months and examined for RPRIH every three months.
Seventeen patients (17.3 percent) were diagnosed with RPRIH about seven months after undergoing surgery. Preoperative computed tomography scans found subclinical inguinal hernia in 20 (20.4 percent) of the 98 patients. Researchers reported that a subclinical inguinal hernia was the single predictive factor for RPRIH. At 12 months, the estimated rate of RPRIH was 60.6 percent in patients with subclinical inguinal hernias and 9.5 percent in patients without subclinical inguinal hernias.
"Retropubic radical prostatectomy might only advance the time at which the inguinal hernia would develop with or without surgery. Thus, all patients with a subclinical inguinal hernia finding should be informed about the possibility of the development of RPRIH within 12 months after retropubic radical prostatectomy and recommended to undergo surgical repair at retropubic radical prostatectomy," the authors conclude.
Abstract
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