Intussusceptions Analysis of 57 cases of intussusceptions at Alkarama Teaching Hospital Wassit-Al-kut

Abstract

      This is a prospective study of 57 cases of intussusception who were admitted to the Alkarama Teaching Hospital   inAl-kut   from the 1^st of October 2011 to the 1^st of March  2014.       Age ranging was from one month to three years and the mean age was (6 months); the commonest age group affected was those between (6-12) months , the male: female ratio was (1.7:1) , the disease was more prevalent in  spring time  .         The  cardinal  symptoms  were  abdominal  pain in 55 patients (96.5%), followed by the passage of red currant jelly stool in 50 patients (87.7%)   and  vomiting  was  present   in  45 patients (78.9%).       The most common sign  was   abdominal mass in 31 patients (54.4%)  .         Most of the patients 35 (61.4%) presented in the (24-48) hours from onset of symptoms.       In diagnosis  we depended mostly on the clinical picture of the disease supported by plain abdominal x-ray , ultrasonography as  Barium enema  was  not feasible.         Surgical management was the only option for alatients. Simple  manual reduction   of the bowel with appendectomy was the procedure in 44 (77.2%) of patients and in 7 patients  (12.3%) resection was done due to gangrenous bowel with primary anastamosis which was not possible in one of them (1.8%) and ended with ileostomy      Six patients (10.5%)   had secondary intussusception and in 4 of them , Meckel`s diverticulum was the lead point  and the other 2 cases the polyps were the cause and all were treated by resection and primary anastamosis. Postoperative complications were recorded in 21 patients (36.8%)    and   mortality  rate  was  recorded  in   one  patient (1.8%).