Preoperative mechanical bowel preparation unnecessary in patients undergoing thoracic surgery.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess a hypothesis that routine mechanical bowel preparation (MBP) is unnecessary before thoracic surgery.

Methods: Five hundreds and sixty cases of standard thoracic surgery including unilateral thoracotomies, bilateral thoracotomies, median sternotomies and video-assisted thoracic surgery have been performed in Kyushu Medical Center Hospital from June 1999 to December 2002. Two hundreds and eighty cases received preoperative MBP and the other 280 cases did not receive it. The usefulness of MBP was assessed retrospectively with these patients.

Results: It proved that cessation of MBP did not provide any disadvantage for postoperative complication and hospital stay.

Conclusions: From these results, routine MBP appears to be unnecessary before thoracic surgery.