Preperitoneal, minimally invasive, prosthetic groin hernia repair

The study describes the advantages of using the positioning of the prosthesis in the pre-peritoneal space by a posterior approach in the repair of inguinal hernia. The research was carried out on 388 patients (372 (96%) men and 16 (4%) women), who had undergone hernioplasties with the insertion of a polypropylene prosthesis by a preperitoneal approach, between January 1994 and December 1996. 216 of these patients (56%) had an indirect inguinal hernia, 94 (24%) a direct inguinal hernia and 78 (20%) a double inguinal hernia (direct and indirect). In 21 cases (6%) it was a recurrent hernia. The following clinical parameters were considered: pain, sensitivity of the inguinal region, testicular pathology, wound pathology and recurrence. 384 patients out of 388 (99%) were discharged at latest one day after the operation. On average the patients went back to work 6 days after the operation. All the patients were checked at least three times out of four, with follow-ups at 30 days, 6 months, 1 year and 2 years after the operation. In 13 patients (1.8%) there was a minor complication, in 3 patients (0.8%) we found an early recurrence due to technical error. We consider that positioning the prosthesis in the preperitoneal space using this minimally invasive procedure can be carried out easily and with very good clinical results in terms of typical early and/or late complications, which range from 2% to 20% by the anterior approach.