[The treatment of inguinofemoral hernias with laparoscopic herniorraphy. Our experience of 1210 transabdominal preperitoneal (TAPP) reconstructions].

In 11 years (1994-2005) our team has carried out 1210 transabdominal preperitoneal herniorrhaphies in 964 patients. We operated monolateral hernias in 602 (62.4%) patients, bilateral hernias in 246 (25.5%), among these occult contralateral hernias in 96 (10%), femoral hernias 20 (2%). 28% (N=269) of all operations were performed on because of recurrent hernias. In 6 selected patients incarcerated hernias were operated on by surgeons with sufficient experience. In 16 patients with concomitant abdominal disease we performed synchronous laparoscopic operations (15 cholecystectomies, 1 Meckel diverticulum resection). The average operation time was 112 minutes (52-195), in monolateral hernias during the learning curve, this was reduced to 57 minutes (40-125). The only conversion (0.08%) was necessary because of bowel injury, two early reoperations (0.16%) happened because of bowel perforation caused by electrocoagulation (laparotomy) and because of clipped nervus cutaneus femoris (clip laparoscopically removed). Sero-haematoma (86 = 7.1%) which is the most common mild complication did not occur after the introduction of routine pre-peritoneal drainage. Hydrocele, which developed in the remnant of the sac was operated on in 3 (0.25%) patients. This complication develops when the hernia sac could not be lifted laparoscopically into the abdominal cavity. This complication was eliminated when we removed the scrotal sac through a small skin incision at the end of the operation. Mean hospital stay was 3 (2-7) days, the mean return to normal activity 7-10 days. The majority (N=9) of 11 (0.9%) recurrences occurred in the learning curve. Our experience which is similar to what can be found in numerous other articles showed, that LH is beneficial (short hospitalisation, early return to normal activity, more favourable operability in bilateral and recurrent hernias, early recognition of contralateral occult hernias, performance of synchronous laparoscopic operations, small recurrence rate, improved surgical training) so it should be rightly considered as the gold standard of inguinal hernioplasties.