Chronic Pain After Inguinal Hernia Repair

Overview

Chronic pain after inguinal hernia repair has become a major concern. Although tension-free Lichtenstein technique is used and new lightweight meshes have been developed, still up to 40 % of patients complain of some kind of pain even one year after surgery. The necessity of mesh-fixation using sutures, could be causative. However, current data do not provide evidence whether suture fixation in Lichtenstein repair might be the reason for chronic postoperative pain. A newly developed selfgrip-mesh enables sutureless fixation of the mesh in open inguinal hernia repair. Hereby a polypropylene mesh is combined with a resorbable polylactic-acid gripping system. Thereby the rate of chronic postoperative pain could be decreased. Two techniques of inguinal hernia repair will be evaluated: 1. open anterior mesh repair using conventional Lichtenstein technique (sutures for mesh-fixation) 2. open anterior mesh repair using a selfgrip mesh (polylactic-acid gripping system for mesh fixation) Postoperative pain will be evaluated by visual analog scale and Mc Gill pain questionaire at the 10th day, as well as 3 and 15 months postoperatively.

Conditions