Perineal pain after rectal amputation: a 5-year follow-up

A long-term study was undertaken on 286 patients who underwent perineal resection for rectal cancer to ascertain the incidence of chronic post-surgical pain in this group and to determine the likely cause for these pains. In 33 patients (11.5%) experiencing persistent perineal pain over the 5-year follow-up, most (70%) developed pain within weeks after surgery. The remaining 30% presented with pain several months later. This group with late onset pain died from known recurrence of adenocarcinoma in 80% of cases, giving this symptom the highest early confirmatory sign for tumour over other clinical tests. Those with early onset pain had a 26% tumour recurrence rate and clinical features of pain indicative of phantom anorectal pains in most cases. While the pain-onset time from surgery was the most sensitive predictor of cause and outcome, other distinguishing features in respect of site and quality of pain as well as differing responsiveness to drug therapy allowed for further separation of deafferentation from nociceptive pain for these two clinical groups.