Validation of ventral hernia risk score in predicting surgical site infections

Ventral hernia risk score (VHRS) is a risk assessment tool for predicting the development of surgical site infection (SSI) developed in the Veterans Affairs population by Berger et al. The score was externally validated by the same study group in a diverse population in another study. It was also shown to be better than the existing Centre for Diseases (CDC) wound class and Ventral Hernia Working Group (VHWG) models. Our study aims to test the performance of the score in an Asian-Indian population.

A prospective database of ventral hernia repairs done in a tertiary care centre between February 2019 and December 2020 was utilized for the study. All patients with a minimum follow-up of 1-month period were included in the study. The CDC definition of SSI was used. The VHRS, VHWG, and CDC class of each of the patients was determined. Receiver-Operating curves (ROC) of the scores and area under the curves (AUC) were used to compare the three scores.

A total of 120 patients were included. During the course of our study, a total of 33 patients developed SSI (27.5%). Important factors which seemed to predict SSI were median operating time, CDC incision class, concomitant hernia repair, and creating skin flaps. The AUC of the VHRS score was 0.76 which was higher than those of VHWG (0.61) and CDC (0.58).

Our study externally validates the novel VHRS which outperforms both CDC incision class and VHWG in predicting SSI following open ventral hernia repair, especially in a group with lower BMI compared to the previous reports. Trial registration No CTRI/2020/07/026289 registered on 01/07/2020.