EVALUATION OF THORACOSCOPY IN THE DIAGNOSIS OF DIAPHRAGMATIC INJURIES IN PENETRATING THORACOABDOMINAL TRAUMA WITHOUT LUNG DEFLATION AT DR GEORGE MUKHARI ACADEMIC HOSPITAL.

BACKGROUND: With a mortality estimated at 25% when missed, diaphragmatic injuries due to penetrating thoracoabdominal trauma present a diagnostic challenge for both the radiologist and the surgeon. In the current literature, chest x-ray has a sensitivity of 27-60% for left-sided injuries and only 17% for right-sided injuries while, CT scan has a sensitivity of 14-61% and a specificity of 76-99%. Thoracoscopy using a single lung ventilation is one of the modalities of choice for the diagnosis of these injuries with a specificity of 100% and a sensitivity of 87.5%.

METHOD: This was a prospective study; all stable trauma patients with penetrating thoracoabdominal injury aged 18 years and above admitted to the trauma unit at Dr George Mukhari Academic Hospital during the period of the study were included. All patients with penetrating thoracoabdominal trauma who were unstable, or necessitating prompt management and all paediatric patients were excluded from the study. In theatre, under general anaesthesia, we first performed thoracoscopy without single lung ventilation followed by laparoscopy as control on each patient. Data was collected using a standard proforma by the attending surgeon and was analysed by a statistician using IBM SPSS 22 software.

RESULTS: A total of 32 patients met the inclusion criteria of which 4 were female (12.5%) and 28 male (87.5%) with the median age of 29 years. Of the 32 patients, 27 had thoracoabdominal stab wounds (84.3%) and 5 had gunshot wounds (15.6%). Fourteen patients (43.75%) had left sided injury and 18 patients (56.25%) had injury to the right side. The incidence of diaphragmatic injury was 37.5% (n = 12). No injuries were missed on thoracoscopy; there was no mortality or morbidity.

CONCLUSION: Thoracoscopy without single lung ventilation is safe and comparable to thoracoscopy with single lung ventilation as a diagnostic tool for diaphragmatic injuries in stable patients with penetrating thoracoabdominal trauma.