Prolene Darn: safe and effective method for primary inguinal hernia repair

The purpose of the study was to evaluate darn repair in terms of morbidity and recurrence rate.

Descriptive study.

Combined Military Hospital, Muzaffarabad from February 1997 to April 2001.

Four hundred and sixty-five consecutive patients above the age of 20 years, with primary inguinal hernia underwent darn repair using polypropylene suture. Two hundred and forty-two patients were operated under spinal anaesthesia, 100 under local anaesthesia while 123 patients had general anaesthesia. Patients were examined on 7th and 12th postoperative day for early complications. Subsequently, they were examined at third month, six-month and then yearly for three years.

Mean age in our study was 52 years (range 20-75). Indirect hernia was present in 305 (65.5%) patients while 160(34.5%) patients had direct hernia. There were 11 (2.4%) postoperative wound infections. Three (0.6%) patients had hematoma formation. Twenty-one (4.5%) patients went into postoperative urinary retention. Three (0.6%) patients developed recurrence; all these patients were among those who had postoperative wound infection. There was no seroma formation. None of the patients developed any testicular complication or postoperative hydrocele. There was no case of dysejaculation or chronic residual neuralgia.

It can be concluded from our results that darn repair using non-absorbable suture is safe procedure. It is easily performed and has a very low recurrence rate which is comparable to any other procedure for primary inguinal hernia.