gms | German Medical Science

Background: EuraHS, the ventral and incisional hernia registry of the European Hernia Society is accessible on the web since June of 2012. The main objective of EuraHS is to collect prospective data regarding the surgical treatment of ventral hernias and the implantation of meshes by means of a post market surveillance registry. The registration is free of charge and EuraHS facilitates the creation of research groups, for example for multicentric studies. The preliminary results of the first EuraHS multicentric study, „Class of 2013“, will be presented.

Materials and methods: The study was approved by ethic votes from Universities in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands and fulfills the requirements of privacy data protection. Procedures for the treatment of ventral and incisional hernias from 8 European centers were prospectively collected from January of 2013 to June of 2013. The data was collected in the comprehensive module of EuraHS, “level 2” (www.eurahs.eu). This module includes data regarding risk factors and quality of life as well as surgical procedure, postoperative course and complications. Additionally, patients were invited to follow up at 6 weeks (done), 1 year and 2 years (to do).

Results: “EuraHS Class of 2013” recruited a total of 382 procedures, 258 incisional hernias, 115 ventral hernias and 9 parastomal hernias. Mean age was 54.97±15.63 for ventral-, 60.45±13.71 for incisional and 62±7.63 for parastomal hernias. Width of the hernia gap was 2.23±1.61, 8.31±5.83 and 6.53±4.94, respective. Duration of the operation in minutes was 50.97±26.17 for ventral and 129.30±46.00 for parastomal hernias, 141.43±67.42 for open incisional repairs and 84.97±43.70 for incisional laparoscopic procedures. The follow-up rate at 6 weeks was 64.92% (248 patients). The final evaluation of the comprehensive data volume – including the 6-week follow up – is not yet completed, but will be available in Edinburgh.

Conclusion: EuraHS is accessible in English, German, French, Italian, Polish and Netherlands. The recruitment phase was uneventful from the viewpoint of informatics. The participants experienced a quick familiarization with the tool. EuraHS proved to be a singular platform for highly standardized data-collection across all Europe with multilingual access. We expect to win a large number of new participants in the next months. As this preliminary data shows, low follow up is a main bias to be improved.