Original article
English
Mabrouk Elhousieni, Mahjoub Rishi, Adel Elhanash
Department of General Surgery , Central Hospital, Faculty of Medicine, Al-Fatah University of Medical Sciences, Tripoli, Libya.
JMJ 2010,Vol.10, No.1:44-47
Abstract
Aim: Laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) has become the ‘gold standard’ of cholecystectomy, the conversion and complications improving with time. The aim of this study was to evaluate the LC in one surgical unit regarding the complications and conversion rate. Patients, Methods and Materials: 345 patients underwent laparascopic cholecystectomy surgery in unit A of General Surgical Department at Tripoli Central Hospital, Libya between 2002 -2005. Their records were analyzed as to the post-operative complications, peri- operative findings and indication for conversion to open cholecystectomy. Results: The mean age was 42 years with male:female = 8.6%:91.4%. 15 cases (4.3%) were converted to open cholecystectomy due to anatomical difficulty, bleeding or intraoperative bile leakage. 68% were operated by the senior surgeons (ME, MR) and 31% by senior registrars (AE). 29 cases (8.4%) had difficult anatomy, 20 cases (5.7%) encountered bleeding during surgery and 5 cases (1.4%) had difficult gallbladder. The drain was left in situ in 249 cases (72%) while bile stained drainage was seen in 37 cases (10.7%) . 5 cases (1.4%) had to be re-operated and 0.8% had some injury to the biliary tree. The average hospital stay was 2 – 3 days (1-15 days). There was no mortality in our series. Conclusion: Our results are comparable to other published series in international literature and we have established LC as the surgical treatment of choice for cholelithiasis in our institution. Judicious patient selection is of utmost importance to avoid unnecessary complications.
Keywords: Laparoscopy, Cholecystectomy, Conversion.
Link/DOI: http://www.jmj.org.ly/images/stories/spring2010/44.pdf