Management of Needle Loss in Laparoscopic Operations

Abstract

The incidence of needles lost during abdominal surgery is considered to be 1 in 9000 abdominal operations. The mostimportant problem is that the reluctance of clinicians and hospitals to disclose such errors and the disclosure of datais often underestimated and concealed because of the prevention of insurance and legal claims by confientialityrequirements. In this case report, we present an obesity patient in whom the needle was lost during gastrectomy. Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy procedure was decided to be performed to the 28-year-old female who presented tothe clinic for bariatric surgery. At the end of the operation, while the needle used in suturing was taken from the trocarto out of the abdomen, it was seperated at the point of junction, fell into the abdomen and could not be located laporoscopically. The operation was terminated due to the development of hypoxia in the patient because of the prolongation of the operation time during the needle search. The localization of the needle was determined on the abdominalcomputed tomography of the patient; the patient was re-operated and the needle was removed. In such cases, theneedle should be localized with the help of imaging and the foreign body lost in the abdomen should be removed,considering the medicolegal problems.