A hernia occurs when the stomach, muscle area weakens resulting in a bulge or a tear. The hernia can cause severe pain, and other potentially serious problems that may require emergency surgery. Both men and women can get a hernia. Hernias do not get better over time nor will go away by themselves, but rather grow in size and give more symptoms. It is better to repair her hernia sooner rather than later.
Common areas where people get hernias are the groin, the bellybutton, above the bellybutton and sometimes in the same location of the previous operation.
If you suspect that to have her hernia, see her family doctor. When it is confirmed that she’ll have one, her family doctor will send you over to see me to discuss surgery to repair this hernia.
Some groin hernias can be treated with a hernia belt. However, most need surgery. I offer all my groin hernia patients laparoscopic repair, which is done under general anesthesia as a day surgery procedure meaning you will go home the same day. In this approach, I use a laparoscope (which is a tiny telescope connected to a special camera) to guide my operative planning. I will most certainly use a piece of cloth “mesh” to repair your hernia. This has been scientifically proven to be one of the best ways to repair groin hernias and to prevent recurrence (hernia come back). At the end of the operation, which usually takes an hour, you will have 3 small skin holes. Overall patients who have had their groin hernias repaired laparoscopically are very very pleased with the short down time (time to recover and recuperate), which is just a few days. Complications are rare. Recurrence. Postoperative groin pain. Damage to abdominal organs or vessels. It is important to be patient, as sometimes starting your urine following this operation can take a little while. If you have had a large hernia to begin with, he will most likely develop a seroma which is simply a fluid collection that happens in the same location of your hernia. It then take a few weeks for your body to dry it out.
I may choose to repair a bellybutton hernia using the traditional open technique. Most of the time I will still use mesh.
One last important thing to note. If you are a smoker and you are expecting me to repair your hernia, I would really ask of you to consider smoking cessation program.
