Masood Jawaid, Zubia Masood, Syed Abdullah Iqbal, Tabinda Sultan.
The pattern of diseases in a surgical unit at a tertiary care public hospital of Karachi.
Pak J Med Sci Jan ;20(4):311-4.

Objective: To study the pattern of diseases in patients admitted in a surgical unit of tertiary care public hospital in Karachi. Design: Descriptive retrospective analysis of patients admitted from January 1, 2004 to June 30, 2004. Setting: Surgical Unit IV, Civil Hospital, Karachi. Results: A total of 501 patients, 284 (56.7%) males and 217 (43.3%) females were admitted during a six months period in Surgical Unit IV of Civil Hospital, Karachi. Out of these 296 (59.1%) patients were admitted through OPD, 190 (37.9%) came from emergency and 15 (3%) from other units. The majority of patients i.e. 114 (22.8%) had gastrointestinal related diseases followed by hernia 94 (18.8%), hepato-biliary diseases 69 (13.8%), ano-rectal diseases 37 (7.4%), abscesses 35 (7%), trauma 28 (5.6%), thyroid diseases 20 (4%), testicular & scrotal related problems 19 (3.7%), breast diseases 17 (3.4%) and tetanus patients 10 (2%). Diabetes mellitus was the commonest associated disease seen in 60 (12%) patients. Four hundred forty-one (88%) patients were discharged after successful treatment while 10 (2.2%) expired during the study period. Conclusion: This study revealed that the commonest cause of admission was gastrointestinal related problems including acute abdomen, followed by hernias and hepato-biliary diseases, while diabetes mellitus was the most common associated disease.

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