Pathologic profile of hysterectomy cases in Saudi Arabia: A tertiary center experience

Abstract

Background: Hysterectomies are increasingly being replaced by more conservative management modalities and are now only used for limited clinical indications. The agreement between these indications and the final pathology is understudied. Objectives: This study aimed to correlate the preoperative clinical diagnoses with the pathological findings detected in hysterectomies in Saudi women of different age groups. Materials and Methods: This retrospective study analyzed the preoperative clinical indications and the subsequent clinical and pathological data of all hysterectomies conducted at a single tertiary care hospital in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia between January 2010 and December 2021. Results: There was no decline in the frequency of hysterectomies across the study period. Abnormal uterine bleeding was the most common clinical indication across all age groups, followed by symptomatic fibroid and uterine prolapse in women aged <50 and ≥50 years, respectively. A total of 9.2% of the cases were indicated for therapeutic reasons, either as an emergency procedure for peripartum hemorrhage or for suspected uterine premalignant and malignant lesions. Besides these, 41.2% of patients had more than one pathology, with the most common combination being leiomyoma and adenomyosis (43.4%). The difference in age between malignant and benign cases (52.3 vs. 48.8 years, respectively) was not statistically significant (P = 0.109). Conclusions: Most of our cohort had benign lesions. Perceptible misuse of the procedure in this cohort was unlikely, as a large proportion of the patients had more than one pathology corresponding to each clinical indication.