ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Anal incontinence (IA) could be of idiopathic, congenital, neurological origin, or secondary to trauma. Obstetric trauma is the most common cause of the traumatic anal incontinence. OBJECTIVE: To analyze results of a group of patients with anal incontinence secondary to obstetric trauma, with overlapping sphincteroplasty. PATIENTS AND METHODS: All patients with anal incontinence secondary to obstetric trauma without neurological damage, between January 2002 to January 2006 were studied; all of them underwent overlapping sphincteroplasty. We evaluated improvement in incontinence score according Jorge and Wexner incontinence scale, pre and postoperatively as well as morbi-mortality rates. RESULTS: 16 patients, most of them with total anal incontinence, with preoperative values between 16 to 20 points at the Jorge and Wexner scale; 14 patients (87.5%) referred improvement in their values with 4 to 0 points postoperatively, two patients did not refer significant improvement, both of them with defects in both sphincters and loss of the 50% of the entire sphincteric complex. They were sent to bio-feedback therapy. There was not mortality. Seven patients (43.7%) had skin dehiscence. CONCLUSIONS: Overlapping sphincteroplasty is an accurately technique for repair obstetric trauma injuries of the anal sphincter, with a success rate of 70 to 80%, and a low morbidity rate.
