Skip to main content

Volume 10 Supplement 1

de Senectute: Age and Health Forum

Pluriannual experience in stapled haemorrhoidopexy in the elderly

Background

Compare two groups of patients, ≥ 70 years old and < 70 years old, diagnosed with III-IV grade haemorrhoids that underwent a stapled haemorrhoidopexy. [1]

Materials and methods

Between May 2001 and October 2009, 299 patients underwent a stapled haemorrhoidopexy (PPH Ethicon-EndoSurgery®). The database was ordered in two groups: the first composed of 29 patients (9,7%) aged ≥ 70, while the second was composed of 270 patients aged < 70. The preferred type of anaesthesia was spinal with sedation (92.8%), associated with elastomeric pump of NSAIDs during the first 24 hours. The two groups were compared in order to verify their homogeneity: no significant differences were found either in the distribution of the grade of the disease, or in the spectrum of symptoms (P >> 0.05). Because of the comorbidity in the elderly, the stratification of the ASA risk was different (P < 0.0001).

Results

The procedure was performed in day surgery, with an average hospital stay of 1 day, in 75% of the patients of the first group and in 94% of the second group; the analysis of the surgical performance of this technique, regarding the timing and the use of haemostatic stitches, showed no significant differences between the two groups (P >> 0.05). Early haemorragic post-operative complications were 2,3% of which 1 occurred in the first group and 6/7 required surgical review. Late haemorragic complications were 3,3%, all of them occurred in the second group; the management of the late haemorrhages required surgical review in 4 patients and blood transfusion in 3 cases. During the first post-operative week several cases of significant anal pain occurred, tenesmus, faecal urgency and two cases of haemorrhoidal thrombosis. During the follow-up, which lasted on average for 3.9 years, we observed 3 relapses (10.3%) among the first group and 21 relapses (7.8%) among the second.

Conclusions

Haemorrhoidal disease, although tending to relapse among susceptible patients, can be effectively treated with stapled haemorrhoidopexy (PPH). Thanks to a several years’ follow-up, our experience shows an assessment of the long-term results of this technique, focusing particularly on the comparison between the results in the elderly and in younger patients. Longo technique is usually well tolerated by all the patients, even though not totally pain-free in the early post-operative follow-up (first week). This procedure can be performed safely in the elderly as well as in the younger patients with equivalent results.

References

  1. Longo A: Cura chirurgica della malattia emorroidaria mediante riduzione del prolasso mucoso ed emorroidario con suturatice. Atti 5 th Int Meeting of Coloproctology. 1998, 1 (1): 231-9.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Open Access This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Spirch, S., Tona, F., Bruttocao, A. et al. Pluriannual experience in stapled haemorrhoidopexy in the elderly. BMC Geriatr 10 (Suppl 1), A79 (2010). https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.1186/1471-2318-10-S1-A79

Download citation

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.1186/1471-2318-10-S1-A79

Keywords