Fig. 1

Flow chart showing patients recruited when scheduled for groin hernia repair, those lost before the telephone interviews, and the group of 239 patients initially diagnosed with CPSP based on physical examination and followed for 2 years. ^aIn order not to overestimate the frequency of CPSP, incidence rates were calculated on a cohort of 1761 patients we intended to follow: from the 2352 patients recruited, 17 were excluded as having been inappropriately enrolled, 312 were lost before phone calling started at 1 month, an additional 254 could not be reached by phone before the diagnostic examination at 4 months, and 8 deaths had occurred. The timeline shows median (10–90th percentile) times in months when data collection occurred, counting from the day of surgery