BMJ 1999;318:1214 ( 1 May )

Letters

Laparoscopic versus open mesh repair of inguinal hernia

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR---Our paper on hernia repair produced much correspondence. 1 2 In response to the letter from Notaras we agree that patients unfit for general anaesthetic, and therefore not suitable for laparoscopic repair, would be suitable for local anaesthetic, and this is how we would treat them. We do not agree that the reduced pain after laparoscopic repair, the improved quality of life, and the faster return to work and other activities are unimportant to the patient. Our view that these constitute important improvements from the patients' perspective is borne out by our table showing patient satisfaction (table 6).

Rose et al point out the absence of serious complications in any of our patients. We state in our discussion that our trial was not powered to detect a difference in serious but rare complications. Good training is essential to avoid these. We have not experienced such complications (vascular injury, gut injury, . . . [Full text of this article]
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to StumbleUpon StumbleUpon   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?

Relevant Article

Randomised controlled trial of laparoscopic versus open mesh repair for inguinal hernia: outcome and cost
James Wellwood, Mark J Sculpher, David Stoker, Graham J Nicholls, Cathy Geddes, Anne Whitehead, Rameet Singh, and David Spiegelhalter
BMJ 1998 317: 103-110. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ