The cumulative incidence and risk factors of postoperative inguinal hernia in patients undergoing radical prostatectomy

Background The aim of this study is to investigate the cumulative incidence and risk factors of postoperative inguinal hernia (PIH) in patients undergoing radical prostatectomy, i.e., laparoscopic prostatectomy (LRP) and robot-assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy (RARP). Methods This study included 1124 patients who had undergone radical prostatectomy or transurethral resection of bladder tumor from 2011−2016. We compared the cumulative incidence of PIH in the radical prostatectomy groups (460; LRP 341, RARP 119) and the control group (664; transurethral resection of bladder tumor), and we then analyzed the risk factors (age, operative methods, previous abdominal operative history, thickness and width of external oblique muscle and rectus muscle, thickness of abdominal subcutaneous fat layer at Hesselbach’s triangle level, body mass index, prostate-specific antigen, operative time, specimen weight, Gleason score, and pathology T-stage) of PIH in the radical prostatectomy groups. Results The median follow-up period in this study was 39.6 months. In Kaplan–Meier curve analysis, the cumulative incidence of PIH was 5.3, 4.2, and 0.5% for the LRP, RARP, and control groups, respectively ( p