Trends and Outcome of Emergency Surgery for Duodenal Ulcer Perforation

Duodenal Ulcer Perforation

The aim of the study is to see the trends and analyse the outcome of perforated duodenal ulcer.

Retrospective study-retrospective review of case records.

Case records of 302 patients of DUP presented to a tertiary teaching institute between January 1992 and June 2004 were retrospectively analysed. Various parameters like age, gender, duration of symptoms, comorbidity, leucocyte count, peritoneal contamination, size o perforation, procedure performed and its outcome were studied.

All cases operated for DUP only were included.

302 patients [274 (90.73%) males and 28 (9.27%)females] underwent surgical procedure for a perforated DUP in this institute. 5 (1.66%) patients underwent a definitive procedure while the rest 297 (98.34%) underwent primary omental patch.

75 (24.83%) patients developed infective complications. 18 (5.96%) of patients developed a bile leak following the surgery. 12 (3.97%) of total patients expired whereas the rest 290 were discharged.

The presentation of patients, trend of surgical procedure and the associated morbidity and mortality is similar to other studies. In our study, incidence of emergency surgery and consequently leak rate and mortality has increased in early 2000s this could be attributed to changing patient demographics and needs to be studied further.