Under-reporting of gossipiboma in a third-world country. A sociocultural view.

The paper looks at the reason for the low incidence of retained abdominal packs following an abdominal operation in a third world country like Nigeria. It is generally agreed that this unfortunate situation is underreported. The reason for under-reporting is now given a socio-cultural perspective. Fear of litigation as would hold in the western world does not seem to be paramount here. Other explanations like fear of being made a scapegoat for something which may be due to spiritual attacks may be paramount. The paper concludes by recommending that the removal of impediments to disclosure of this adverse surgical event will lie in education, discouragement of scapegoatism and improvement in hospital services in the third world.