Operating and anaesthetic time required for inguinal hernia repair in the neonate

Inguinal hernia repair in neonates can be a challenging operation and anaesthetic. However, there is no information on how much anaesthetic and operating time is required for such surgery. Planning operating time and resources requires this knowledge. This study looked at 94 neonatal hernia repairs and compared anaesthetic and operating times for these patients with 297 day-case hernia repairs. The median anaesthetic and operating times for neonates with unilateral repair were 20 and 45 min compared with 13 and 30 min for day-cases. However, the ranges for anaesthetic time (10-185 min) and operating time (20-170 min) were considerably in excess of those for day-cases (0-54 and 15-80 min) respectively. Neonatal hernia operations accounted for a total of one theatre list per month in our centre.