Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy: To Suture or not to Suture Staple Line?

Objective To assess the outcome and safety of staple line over-sewing for patients undergoing laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG). Study design and location Retrospective descriptive analysis conducted at Shifa International Hospital Islamabad. Materials and methods Consecutive patients undergoing LSG as a treatment for morbid obesity from October 2013 to December 2016 were included in the study after approval from the ethical review board. Patients were divided into two groups: group A who underwent reinforcement using Vicryl 2.0 and group B where no reinforcement was done. Results A total of 225 patients underwent LSG between October 2013 and December 2016, including 147 females (65.4%) and 78 males (34.6%). Both groups were comparable in terms of age, body mass index (BMI) and gender distribution (p-value more than 0.05). There was one leak in group A (1.36%), none in group B. The bleeding rate was 4.3% in group A and 2.7% in group B. Conclusion This was a retrospective analysis of all the patients who underwent LSG, and it was observed that there was no added benefit of sewing the staple line in terms of rate of bleeding and leak.