ORIGINAL ARTICLES   

Minerva Chirurgica 2014 June;69(3):141-6

Copyright © 2014 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

The effect on postoperative pain of pulling the rectus muscle medially during open appendectomy surgery

Turk E. ¹, Acimis N. M. ², Karaca F. ³, Edirne Y. ³, Tan A. ⁴, Kilic C. ⁵ ✉

¹ Department of Pediatric Surgery, Izmir University, Faculty of Medicine, Izmir, Turkey; ² Department of Public Health, Haci Cafer Ozer Community Health Centre, Denizli, Turkey; ³ Denizli State Hospital, Clinics of Pediatric Surgery, Denizli, Turkey; ⁴ Denizli State Hospital, Clinics of Pathology, Denizli, Turkey; ⁵ Department of Anatomy, Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Etlik, Ankara, Turkey

AIM: We investigated whether pulling the rectus muscle medially during open appendectomy surgery had any effect on postoperative pain in this study.
METHODS: This prospective study was performed on patients 6 years and older who were admitted for acute appendicitis. The patients were divided into two groups, open appendectomy was performed by pulling the rectus muscle medially in the first group and splitting the rectus muscle in the second group. Pain was evaluated in both groups at preoperative and 12 and 24 hour postoperative by using a visual analog scale graded.
RESULTS: The first group consisted of 31 and the second group of 30 patients. The preoperative and 12 and 24 hour postoperative pain evaluation results were 8.25±1.03, 2.96±1.40 and 1.16±0.93 in the first group and 8.36±0.99, 4.90±1.24 and 2.03±1.06 respectively in the second group. There was no statistically significant difference between the two groups for age, gender, inpatient duration and preoperative pain scores while the 12 and 24 hour postoperative pain scores were lower in the first group than the second group. This difference was statistically significant (P<0.05).
CONCLUSION: Performing the appendectomy by pulling the rectus muscle medially in clinics using open appendectomy will provide a more comfortable postoperative period for the children.