Spectrum of Adult Digestive Diseases Presenting at a Suburban Tertiary Health Facility in Nigeria

Background: Diseases of the digestive system vary in type and distribution worldwide. There is presently no comprehensive audit of the types of digestive diseases presenting at any particular tertiary health facility in Nigeria. We present an audit of the digestive diseases presenting over a period of four years (2012 to 2015) at the LAUTECH Teaching Hospital, Ogbomoso, Nigeria, a suburban healthcare facility.

Methodology: Outpatient and inpatient digestive disease cases and relevant information were extracted from the medical and surgical gastroenterology clinics’ and wards’ registers. Patients’ case files were retrieved from the medical records department and consulted for clarification when necessary. Diagnoses were categorized according to the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems 10th Revision, 2016 version (ICD-10) codes for digestive diseases. Data were stratified into outpatient cases, inpatient (admissions) cases, in-hospital mortalities and digestive cancers.

Results: There was a total of 799 gastrointestinal clinic cases. Chronic hepatitis B was the commonest cause of clinic visit (28.8%). Appendicitis was the most frequent cause of admission (16.0%) of the 682 gastrointestinal admissions. There was a total of 86 in-hospital digestive disease mortalities of which hepatocellular carcinoma was the leading cause at 22.1%. Of the 188 cases of digestive cancers identified; hepatocellular carcinoma had the highest frequency (43.4%) and the highest mortality (59.4%).

Conclusion: A very important finding from this study is fact that chronic hepatitis B and its attendant sequelae (liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma) constituted a substantial proportion of the digestive diseases among our study population.