Bedside diagnostic laparoscopy for critically ill patients: a retrospective study of 62 patients.

Background: Bedside diagnostic laparoscopy has an important role of diagnosing acute abdomen in critically ill patients hospitalized in the intensive care unit (ICU). Delayed diagnosis of intraabdominal pathology increases the morbidity and mortality rates for these patients, whose clinical signs often are absent due to analgesic medication and sedation.

Methods: In this retrospective study performed from January 2007 to December 2009, 62 consecutive ICU patients whose blood test results showed them to be hemodynamically unstable underwent bedside diagnostic laparoscopy.

Is laparoscopy safe and effective in nontraumatic acute abdomen?

Background And Aims: Progress in laparoscopic experience has increased the number of laparoscopic procedures performed, even in emergency cases. Herewith, results in a prospective series of 300 patients laparoscopically treated for nontraumatic abdominal emergencies are presented with the intent to prove the safety and feasibility of laparoscopic approach in the treatment of acute abdomen.

Materials And Methods: From a prospective multicenter study performed between June 2008 and December 2009, the authors collected data on 300 patients with a provisional diagnosis of acute abdomen, laparoscopically treated or who underwent explorative laparoscopy.

[Perforated jejunal diverticulitis: a case report].

The authors present a case of midgut perforated diverticulitis in a 78-year-old patient, associated with a colovesical fistula and sigmoid obstruction of diverticular origin. Surgical resection of the small bowel segment affected together with primary anastomosis is the preferred treatment in patients with symptomatic complicated jejunoileal diverticular disease. In complicated midgut diverticulitis the preoperative diagnosis is a challenge: the symptoms are aspecific and imaging techniques are of no use.

Gallbladder strangulation within an incisional hernia.

We describe here the first case in the literature of gallbladder strangulation within an incisional hernia. A patient with a history of rectal cancer operation presented with a "surgical abdomen" and a palpable right upper quadrant mass at the site of the previous colostomy. At surgery, a strangulated gallbladder was found in the subcutaneous tissue.

[Hand-assisted videolaparoscopic surgery of the abdominal aorta: preliminary experience with the first 9 cases].

Laparoscopic surgery decreases postoperative pain, shortens hospital stay, and returns patients to full functional status more quickly than open surgery in a variety of surgical procedures. This study was undertaken to evaluate laparoscopic techniques as applied to aortic surgery. Nine patients underwent elective hand-assisted laparoscopic surgery, 8 for obliterative disease and 1 for an aneurysm of the abdominal aorta.