High incidence of varicocele among young men in Public Police Hospital Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia: a descriptive study

Abstract

Background: Varicocele is a progressive disease which possibly starts from puberty. When left untreated, it could progress and causes complications such as infertility. Determination on the representative national incidence and characteristic of varicocele has been a hard challenge due to the lack of data on varicocele epidemiological studies, especially in Bali. This study aims to know the characteristic of varicocele patients undergoing varicocelectomy in Bhayangkara Denpasar Hospital from January 2017 to December 2018. Methods: This research is a descriptive retrospective study with cross sectional approach. The population of the study consists of patients who were diagnosed with varicocele and underwent varicocelectomy in Bhayangkara Denpasar Hospital from January 2017 to December 2018. Total sampling method was used. Research data were retrieved by taking the patient’s entire medical record with varicocele in Bhayangkara Denpasar Hospital from January 2017 to December 2018.Results: Ninty five samples were diagnosed with varicocele and underwent varicocelectomy. The highest percentage among age groups is 15 to 24 years (89.5%), with normal stature (94%), normal weight (86%), asymptomatic (90.5%), left unilateral varicocele (86.%), grade III varicocele (82,1%) and without comorbid (93.8%). The samples underwent varicocelectomy with Ivanissevich procedure (72.8%), operation time of ≤ 60 minutes (95.8%) and length of stay of ≤ 2 days (95.8%).Conclusion: The high incidence of varicocele in young adulthood is due to a majority of the samples being young police recruitment participants who were accidentally diagnosed during general medical check-up. Early screening on varicocele in the age group of 15 to 24 years is recommended to consider the need of sperm analysis examination and further deciding on the treatment options. One of the options is surgery.