What is splenectomy?
Splenectomy is a surgical procedure to remove your spleen.
What is the function of the spleen?
The spleen is an organ that sits under your rib cage on the upper left side of your abdomen. It helps fight infection and filters unneeded material, such as old or damaged blood cells, from your blood.
In what cases is splenectomy prescribed?
The most common reason for splenectomy is to treat a ruptured spleen.
Splenectomy may be used to treat other conditions, including an enlarged spleen that is causing discomfort (splenomegaly), some blood disorders.
Splenectomy is used to treat a wide variety of diseases and conditions.
Your doctor may recommend splenectomy if you have one of the following:
- Ruptured spleen.
- Enlarged spleen.
- Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura.
- Polycythemia vera
- Thalassemia.
- Chronic lymphocytic leukemia.
- Hodgkin's lymphoma.
- Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma
- Hairy cell leukemia.
- Infection.
- Cyst or tumor.
Open or laparascopic operation
Spleen excision is performed both openly and laparoscopically.
During laparoscopic splenectomy, the surgeon makes small incisions in your abdomen. Blood loss during laparoscopic splenectomy is much less, the time of postoperative delay in the hospital is short, the risk of wound complication is reduced to a minimum, and the patient returns to an active lifestyle in time.
Life without a spleen
After splenectomy, other organs in your body take over most of the functions previously performed by your spleen.
You can be active without a spleen, but you're at increased risk of becoming sick or getting serious infections.
To reduce your risk of infection, your doctor may recommend vaccines against pneumonia, influenza, Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib) and meningococci.
In some cases, he or she may also recommend preventive antibiotics, especially for children under 5 and those with other conditions that increase the risk of serious infections.
Source:
https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/splenectomy/about/pac-20395066
