Surgical mesh blocks abdominal U/S

[ohiovolffemtp]

I recently had a patient with abdominal pain and a possible abdominal mass.  While I was waiting for CT to come get her I tried a bedside U/S.  Pretty much all I could see what dense white material just below the skin level, approximately 1.2-3 cm deep.  She had well healed surgical incisions at the site, but I wasn't expecting this from just scar tissue.  Turns out she had mess implanted to try to repair  a ventral hernia.  It had shifted and balled up.  The CT read was able to describe it - BTW, it looked strangely white on an abd CT with contrast.

On U/S it didn't have the shadow of bone or other dense material, just intense white with nothing visible below.