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©The Author(s) 2025. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Transplant. Dec 18, 2025; 15(4): 107578
Published online Dec 18, 2025. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v15.i4.107578
Published online Dec 18, 2025. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v15.i4.107578
Incisional hernia repair following liver transplantation: A meta-analysis
Shanmuga Sundaram Kannan, General Surgery, Luton and Dunstable University Hospital, Luton LU40DZ, United Kingdom
Pradeep Kumar Sabapathy, Abdul Rahman Hakeem, Institute of Liver Studies, King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, London SE5 9RS, United Kingdom
Arifa Lulu Theruvin Kattil, General Surgery, Leeds General Infirmary, Leeds LS1 3EX, United Kingdom
Author contributions: Hakeem AR and Kannan SS conceptualized the study design, wrote the manuscript; Hakeem AR, Kannan SS and Sabapathy PK prepared the search strategy, PRIMSA chart, and data collection tools; Sabapathy PK and Kattil ALT did the data collection from the included reviews and performed quality and risk of bias assessments; all authors revised the manuscript and confirmed the final draft for submission.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Abdul Rahman Hakeem, FACS, FRCS, PhD, Institute of Liver Studies, King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Denmark Hill, London SE5 9RS, United Kingdom. abdul.hakeem1@nhs.net
Received: March 26, 2025
Revised: May 9, 2025
Accepted: July 29, 2025
Published online: December 18, 2025
Processing time: 238 Days and 8.3 Hours
Revised: May 9, 2025
Accepted: July 29, 2025
Published online: December 18, 2025
Processing time: 238 Days and 8.3 Hours
Core Tip
Core Tip: This systematic review and meta-analysis provide a comprehensive evaluation of incisional hernia (IH) following liver transplantation, synthesizing evidence on risk factors, surgical techniques, and repair outcomes. It identifies high body mass index, male sex, older age, and re-laparotomy as key risk factors, and highlights a higher incidence of IH with Chevron and Mercedes-Benz incisions. While laparoscopic and open repairs show comparable outcomes, biological mesh may reduce complications in immunosuppressed patients. These findings emphasize the importance of individualized surgical planning and underscore the need for standardized outcome reporting and integration of quality-of-life measures in future research.