Hirschsprung's disease and Rehbein's procedure--our results in the last 30 years

Hirschsprung's disease is congenital anomaly of the intestine and Harald Hirschsprung gave the first description of this disease'. The aim of this follow-up study was to evaluate the results of Rehbein's procedure in the treatment of Hirschsprung's disease in the last 30 years in Children's Hospital Zagreb. Hirschsprung's disease is congenital intestinal aganglionosis as the results of arrested fetal development of the myenteric nervous system. Hirschsprung's disease is affecting between 1:5000 to 1:8000 live births. A total of 124 children underwent Rehbein's lower anterior resection at Children's Hospital Zagreb. The principle of Rehbein'procedure is to remove aganglionic narrow segment and dilated sigmoid colon and anastomosis between normal intestine with rectal stump. The postoperative outcome was analysed for early and late complications like wound infections, abscesses, anastomotic insufficiency, postoperative enterocolitis, constipation, fecal incontinence, need for reoperation, ileus and mortality. On the basis of our results and data from literature we concluded that Rehbein's procedure is an excellent method for treatment Hirschsprung's disease.