Inguinal hernia repair in England

120,000 groin hernias are repaired every year in Britain by the 1,000 consultant general surgeons and their junior staff. Most of these are elective operation and the average patient stays in hospital for slightly less than a week. Some patients only present to the doctor when a complication of their hernia develops which requires an emergency operation. A few people prefer to live with truss. We must hope that the increasing safety of surgery and free health care will gradually eliminate both these latter two categories of patient.