Surgical outcomes on health-related quality of life in rectal prolapse: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Rectal prolapse is a serious but not life-threatening condition. It can involve many complications, including quality-of-life changes. Surgical intervention is the standard medical treatment for these patients. In this article, we aim to investigate the quality-of-life outcomes in patients undergoing rectal prolapse surgery, compare different surgical methods, and assess different quality-of-life questionnaires to study these patients. We conducted a systematic literature search on PubMed, Scopus, ScienceDirect, and Embase. A total of 4916 studies were screened, resulting in a final 34 included studies, and 20 were included in the meta-analysis. Data were extracted from studies comparing the quality of life in rectal prolapse patients before and after surgery. Except for one, all included studies reported improved quality-of-life scores. Different instruments were used to examine these patients' quality of life, but SF-36 was implemented most frequently. It comprises eight different domains, and these domains were reported in six different studies. All eight domains showed better outcomes after surgery. The final analysis was based on the surgical approach (perineal or abdominal) and showed no statistically significant superiority of any of the approaches. The high heterogeneity of the included studies. Surgical intervention can improve the quality of life of rectal prolapse patients. However, there is no consensus on which surgical approach achieves the best outcomes. Different instruments are used to evaluate the quality of life in these patients, but there is no specific questionnaire to assess this.