[Penetrating abdominal wounds caused by weapons in the service of general surgery in the Gabriel Touré teaching hospital].

Introduction: Providing care for penetrating abdominal wounds is a controversial subject. The aim of this project was to describe their epidemiological, clinical and therapeutic aspects.

Materials And Methods: This retrospective study conducted over 4 years, from January 2006 to January 2010 concerned 70 cases of penetrating abdominal injury in the general surgery department of the Gabriel TOURE teaching hospital. Non-piercing and animal horn related abdominal injuries were not included.

Results: We collated 70 cases of penetrating abdominal wounds; representing 1.2% of hospitalisations during the studied time frame. The patients were 12 to 59 years old with a mean age of 27.7 years and a sex-ratio of 9 to 1 for men. 27 patients (38.36%) came from districts I and II of Bamako. Criminal injuries was the main cause of injury encountered representing 70% cases. 3 of the patients had psychiatric antecedents and 45.7% of patients regularly consumed drugs. The epiploon and small intestine were the main eviscerated organs (51.4% cases). 17/53 patients received non-surgical treatment. The rate of laparotomia was of 30.2% and postoperative morbidity 15.1%.

Conclusion: Treating penetrating abdominal injury remains difficult. A good selection of patients allow the service to lower the rate of laparotomia.