Many a times, pregnant women defer important operations out of fear that their pregnancy may result in complications during surgery. However, a new study published in the December issue of the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology has found that there is no effect of pregnancy on the outcomes of surgeries like appendectomy and cholecystectomy.
The study was carried out with the purpose of finding out the difference in outcome of appendectomy and cholecystectomy operations, in pregnant and non pregnant states. It was led by Dr. Elisabeth Erekson from the Yale School of Medicine and compared the fate of surgeries between 1,300 pregnant women and around 51,000 non pregnant women who were otherwise similar in all other aspects. It was seen that among the 800 pregnant women who underwent appendectomy, four of every hundred women suffered a complication in the post operative period. Among the non pregnant women, the rate of complications was three out of every hundred women who underwent the operation. The difference is too small to be considered significant and was most likely, by chance.
Similarly, the researchers noted that two out of every hundred women who underwent cholecystectomy suffered from a complication irrespective of the fact that the woman undergoing the surgery was pregnant or not. The researchers therefore concluded that pregnancy does not affect the fate of appendectomy or cholecystectomy.
According to Dr. Erekson, there is no point in delaying emergency operations like removal of an inflamed appendix even if the patient is a pregnant lady. Inflammation of the gall bladder is usually not an emergency situation. Therefore, it depends on the surgeon when he wants to operate the patient. However, even in this case, delaying the operation just because of the pregnant state of the patient is not warranted.
The researchers have found that although there is no effect of the operations on postoperative maternal morbidity, the effect of anesthesia on the fetus has not been covered in the study. Although earlier studies have shown that fetus generally withstand anesthesia without suffering any harm, this requires additional studies so that any fetal harm due to surgery can be completely ruled out.
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