Littre hernia in childhood: A case report with a brief review of the literature

Abstract

A 3-year-old boy with a right-sided and painful inguinal swelling for the last 2 h was admitted to the emergency department. As there were no apparent peritoneal irritation findings, right-sided incarcerated inguinal hernia was reduced and the patient was scheduled for an elective herniorrhaphy. Perioperatively even though the sac seemed empty, it was opened in order to inspect its content. The adherence of Meckel’s diverticulum (MD) to the base of hernial sac was realized and Littre hernia (LH) was diagnosed. The hernia was highly ligated after the wedge resection of the diverticulum and anastomosis. The patient was fed on the second postoperative day and discharged on the third postoperative day. Despite numerous presentations of LH in the adult age group in the literature, there are limited data about the disease in the childhood period. Even though the scarcity of the data, there are some so-called rules for LH in childhood like protruding more common through umbilical hernias, containing heterotopic tissues more frequent than adult age and incarcerating/strangulating more often. The aim of this study is to review the reported LH cases, present a new case and discuss the features of LH in childhood period.

Key words: Children, littre hernia, meckel’s diverticulum in hernial sac