DETECTION OF OCCULT ANAL SPHINCTER TRAUMA FOLLOWING INSTRUMENTAL DELIVERY BY ANAL ENDOSONOGRAPHY

Abstract

The mm of this work was to study the incidence of occult anal sphincter trauma after instrumental delivery in comparison to non-instrumental delivery and to study the role of anal endosonography for imaging these clinically undetected anal sphincter tears.

We studied 50 women who underwent instrumental vaginal delivery and 20 women who underwent non-instrumental vaginal delivery. Both groups were fully continent and asymptomatic regarding any anal complaints.

Anal endosonography was performed to all women immediately postpartum and the integrity of the internal and the external anal sphincters was assessed.

34% of women who underwent instrumental vaginal delivery sustained occult anal sphincter defect whereas 10% of non-instrumental group had occult anal defect. 16 of 30 women (53.3%) delivered by forceps suffered from such defect whereas only 1of 20 women (5%) delivered by vacuum extraction had occult