Psychological implications in percutaneous <i>Hallux Valgus</i> surgery

Background.Despite the evolution of the surgical technique, sometimes patients complain of dissatisfaction even though the objective post-operative parameters do not demonstrate obvious complications. Theaimofthestudy— to evaluate psychological implications for post-operative pain perception after hallux valgus surgery in patients who had already undergone contralateral foot surgery. Methods.The study included 42 patients treated with percutaneous surgery for bilateral hallux valgus in two different time periods (40 females and 2 males; mean-age at the 1stsurgery — 55.7 years; mean-age at the 2ndsurgery — 56.7 years). All patients were administered a visual analog scale (VAS) one week after surgery to judge post-operative pain. Each of them was evaluated clinically to assess post-operative convalescence. The patients were randomly divided into 2 groups: in group A, patients have not received further indications about post-operative pain in contralateral surgery; in group B, patients have been informed that post-operative pain would have been worse in contralateral surgery. Both groups received the same anesthesiological and pharmacological support in the peri-operative period. Results.The VAS pain score was 1.03 and 1.55 after first surgery; 4.57 and 0.5 after second surgery for group A and group B, respectively. All patients reported no pain 7 days after surgery. No significant clinical variation was reported. Conclusion.We observed the great importance of psychological implications for pain perception in patients undergoing foot surgery. The role of a surgeon is related not only to technical skills, but it is also conditioned by their ability to drive patients’ individual perception of post-operative outcome.