A Risky Hernia Procedure Is Gaining Popularity

Some doctors are learning how to perform a complicated and risky medical procedure that has recently gained popularity by watching online videos or attending quick trainings. And the New York Times reports that in a growing number of cases, patients are being left painfully disfigured after going under the knife. The surgery, called component separation, has long been used in plastic surgery, but in 2006, it gained traction as a way to repair hernias. Per WebMD, hernias occur when an organ or fatty tissue pushes through a small hole or weak spot in nearby muscle or connective tissue. Component separation could make sense for closing up large or complicated hernias. But the uptick in component separation of small hernias (which typically undergo less risky—and cheaper—methods), has increased significantly.

"It's unbelievable," surgeon Michael Rosen of the Cleveland Clinic tells the Times. "I'm watching reasonably healthy people with a routine problem get a complicated procedure that turns it into a devastating problem." He said training doctors on how to perform component separation was one of his "biggest regrets," and half of his operations today are spent fixing botched procedures. Part of the problem comes from the muscle group around abdominal hernias—if the wrong sections or nerve bundles are cut, many complications can occur, including new hernias, painful protrusions, or even rendering the abs useless.

Data from Medicare shows that since 2006, hernia component separation has risen by a factor of 10 to about 8,000 per year, per the Times. However, a University of Michigan study found that the complicated procedure was not needed a third of the time it was performed. And per a recent survey, one out of four doctors learned how to execute it by watching videos on Facebook or YouTube (84% of the most trafficked instructional videos on YouTube contained errors, one study found). A popular Facebook group serves as a hub for hernia surgeons, where 13,000 members talk shop and sometimes post videos of their surgeries (often enough, containing mistakes). Read the full story. (More surgery stories.)