Complications of diagnostic laparoscopy in Dallas: a 7-year prospective study

The complication rate for diagnostic laparoscopy reported in the literature is very low (1.07%, 0.3%, and 0.03% for minor and major complications, and deaths, respectively). A prospective study of the complications of diagnostic laparoscopy by 17 gastroenterologists in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area is reported. In 603 laparoscopies performed during a 7-year period, there were 31 (5.1%) minor complications and 14 (2.3%) major complications requiring surgery or transfusion. These rates are five- and sevenfold higher (p less than 0.01) than are reported in retrospective series in the literature. There were three (0.49%) deaths in this series. It is concluded that retrospective studies have underestimated the complication rate of laparoscopy. However, despite the higher complication rate found in this prospective study, laparoscopy appears to be as safe or safer than other methods of establishing a tissue diagnosis under direct vision in intraabdominal diseases.