Tehran University Medical Journal

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE AR-SA MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Background: Appendicitis is more common during the second and third decade of life and appendectomy scar is important in terms of cosmetic issues. The scar is an important factor in the patient's satisfaction. Conventional teaching has an emphasis on the closure of skin incision with "separate" sutures. The aim of this study was to reconsider this dogma.
Methods: Among 321 patients with acute appendicitis who came to the emergency unit of Imam Khomeini Hospital in Tehran, Iran since april 2007 till april 2008, 278 (86.6%) patients had uncomplicated appendicitis and were enrolled in our clinical trial. The patients were randomly assigned to two groups of interrupted suture closure (n=139) and subcuticular suture closure (n=139). Anesthesia method and surgical technique were similar between the two groups. All patients were followed up post-operatively (four weeks) for the presence of infectious drainage, pain, erythema, swelling and warmness at the surgical site.
Results: The patients' sex and their mean age were not statistically different between the groups. There was no significant difference in the frequency of surgical site complications between the two groups (five cases in the "interrupted" group and eight cases in the "subcuticular" group p=0.415).
Conclusion: This study showed that appendectomy incision closure with subcuticular sutures did not increase the risk of wound complications. From the point of better cosmetic outcome of subcuticular sutures, this method may be the method of choice for the closure of appendectomy incisions in uncomplicated appendicitis.

Background: Cesarean delivery is the most common surgical procedure and this prevalence is on the rise. Given these trends, cesarean wound complications, such as disruption or infection, remain an important cause of post-cesarean morbidity.

Methods: We conducted a single-center randomized controlled trial that included women with viable pregnancies (≥24 weeks) undergoing cesarean delivery at Motahary University Hospital, Urmia, Iran from April to November 2014. All cesarean types were included: scheduled or unscheduled and primary or repeat cesareans. Women were excluded for the following reasons: inability to obtain informed consent, immune compromising disease (e.g. AIDS), chronic steroid use, diabetic mellitus and BMI≥30. Of 266 women, 133 were randomized to staples and 133 women to suture group.

Results: The mean±SD age of the staples group was 27.6±5.4 years and mean±SD age of suture was 28.7±5.9 years. Multiparity is the most frequent in both groups that by using Chi-square test, no significant differences were observed between the two groups (P=0.393). The most frequent indication for cesarean section in both groups was history of cesarean section in staple 40 cases (30.1%) and suture 32 cases (24.1%). The survey was conducted using the Chi-square test was not significant (P=0.381). Pain at 6 weeks postoperatively was significantly less in the staple group (P=0.001). Operative time was longer with suture closure (4.68±0.67 versus 1.03±0.07 minute, P<0.001). The Vancouver scale score was significantly less in suture closure (6.6±0.8 versus 7.5±0.9, P=0.001). Wound disruption was significantly less in suture closure (3.8% versus 11.3%, P=0.017).

Conclusion: The staple group had low pain and operation time but had a significant wound disruption and scar. The patients who have suffered a significant wound disruption were affected by age (P=0.022) and BMI (P=0.001) at compared those who were not affected by factors such as age or high BMI as risk factors for open surgical wound.