Intussusception in children: 11-year experience in Vladivostok

Idiopathic intussusception is an important abdominal emergency in infancy and childhood. The nonoperative management by air enema has always been the standard of care in Russia. Our purpose is to assess our reduction rate and the rate of complications. We performed a retrospective analysis of all intussusception cases seen at the Department of Paediatric Surgery from 1994 to 2005. The data obtained included age, sex, clinical presentation, diagnostic procedures, mode of treatment, and results. Patients included 280 children from 1 month to 14 years of age. Eighty-one percent of children were under age 1 year old, 61% were boys. The duration of symptoms before treatment was less than 18 h in 65%, 18–24 h in 21%, and more than 24 h in 14% of patients. The successful reduction rate was 86.1%. One patient with a duration of symptoms more than 24 h experienced colon perforation. Thirty-nine patients underwent surgery and, among these, abnormalities in the intestinal wall required resection in 12 cases. An association between the duration of symptoms and the outcome of the non-surgical treatment was present; non-surgical reduction was successful in 97.3% in the group with the duration of symptoms less than 18 h, 86.4% in 12–24 h, and 33.3% in more than 24 h. Air enema is a safe and effective approach for uncomplicated intussusception reduction with a high success rate, but the duration of symptoms directly increases the complication rate.