Effectiveness of intestinal tube splinting: a prospective observational study

To assess the effectiveness of intestinal tube splinting.

The clinical, operative and outcome data of 186 patients undergoing 200 intestinal splinting procedures from 1973 until 1996 were accumulated in a prospective database. Endpoints were perioperative morbidity, mortality and the incidence of subsequent small bowel obstruction (SBO). The latest follow-up performed in 1998 updated the outcome of 197 procedures after 1-25 (median 7) years.

In the early postoperative period, the overall incidence of complications was 9%, procedural complications 2%, and repeat surgery 3%. Three patients died during the index hospitalization. No patient suffered early SBO. Between 1 and 13 years after splinting, 6 complete SBOs (3%) necessitated reoperation and 5 incomplete SBOs (2.5%) were managed conservatively. After splinting for late SBO, freedom from complete SBO was 0.989 and of incomplete SBO 0.906, after splinting for early SBO 0.872 and 0.972, respectively, and for segmental peritonitic SBO freedom from complete SBO 0.8. No obstruction followed prophylactic splinting.

Splinting was a reasonably safe procedure with comparatively low morbidity and mortality. The procedure prevented early SBO in all indicatory subgroups, reduced the rate of late recurrent SBO in patients treated for late adhesive SBO as compared with historical outcome data of simple enterolysis and prevented late SBO when performed prophylactically.