Determining external genital abnormalities with a pre-circumcision examination in previously undiagnosed male school children.

Abstract

We investigated whether children getting ready for circumcision under local anesthesia had any additional genital region abnormalities not detected before the circumcision. We performed circumcision under local anesthesia for children with normal physical examination findings, and together with corrective surgery for those with other genital anomalies among the children aged 6 years old and over presenting at the pediatric surgery department of our hospital during the school break. Circumcision was planned under local anesthesia in a total of 1,695 cases aged between 6 and 17 years during the June to September 2010 and 2011 periods. We found an external genital anomaly in the pre-circumcision physical examination in 58 patients (3.4%), with a mean age of 7.87 ± 1.49 years. These patients were operated on with corrective surgery while 1,637 children underwent circumcision under local anesthesia. The most common anomaly was inguinal hernia seen in 14 (24.1%), followed by hypospadias in 11 (18.9%), hydrocele in 9 (15.9%) and undescended testis in 8 (13.8%). In countries where circumcision is traditional, an intervention room within the hospital to perform circumcision under local anesthesia can enable many children to be circumcised under hospital conditions and previously undetected genital abnormalities to be found with a pre-circumcision genital region examination.