ABSTRACT

Purpose:

Intussusception which is seen more often in children may be encountered as one of the reasons causing mechanical intestinal obstruction in adults. However, pathologies causing intussusception in adults differ from the pathologies causing intussusception in children. Treatment strategies are also different according to the age group. In our study, we searched the diagnosis and treatment strategies of intususception in adults and decided to share our clinical experience on the subject.

Method:

Patients older than 18 who administered to İzmir Tepecik Education and Search Hospital, 2nd General Surgery Clinic between October 1998 and July 2006 and diagnosed preoperative and perioperative with intussusception were retrospectively investigated.

Results:

Seven patients were treated with the diagnosis of intususception. Mean age of the patients was 40.2. Most of the patients were presented by the signs and symptoms of mechanical bowel obstruction (5/7). In four of them ileocecocolic intussusception was encountered while three of them was diagnosed with enteric intussusception. In 71,4% of the patients,the intususception was caused by a pathological condition. All of the patients were treated by surgery.

Conclusion:

Intussusception is a rare disease in adults.It is usually difficult to diagnose due to the non-spesific nature of the findings in the patients with chronic symptoms. Although abdominal CT scans are the golden standart of the diagnosis, our clinical experience proved that clinical suspician is the main step towards the diagnosis. Experienced radiologists can also detect the intussusception by ultrasound. In the most of the patients, a pathologic lesion is detected and these lesions are usually malign (especially in the colonic forms). For this reason,the treatment usually involves surgery. For patients with ileocecocolic and colocolic intussusception en-bloc resection is recommended while for patients with enteric intussusception reduction prior to resection may be tried.