SUMMARY. The magnitude of the inflammatory response to surgery depends on the degree of injury during surgical procedures. Laparoscopic techniques are generally associated with less postoperative pain and shorter hospital stay compared with open procedures, presumably due to less tissue injury and reduced inflammatory response. However, no study has been done, to our knowledge, to assess the inflammatory response to surgical trauma following laparoscopic assisted vaginal hysterectomy. We have, therefore, compared the magnitude of the inflammatory response to injury after laparoscopically assisted vaginal hysterectomy (II patients) and abdominal hysterectomy (II patients) by measuring serum C-reactive protein (CRP) and interleukin-6 (lL-6) on admission, and at 24 and 48 hours after the operation. Postoperatively, serum CRP rose significantly in both groups but levels in patients who underwent laparoscopically assisted vaginal hysterectomy were significantly lower than in those who underwent abdominal hysterectomy. Serum IL-6 rose significantly after abdominal hysterectomy but not after laparoscopically assisted vaginal hysterectomy. Our results show that the inflammatory response to surgical trauma was significantly less after laparoscopically assisted vaginal hysterectomy than after abdominal hysterectomy confirming that the laparoscopic procedure causes less tissue damage than the abdominal procedure.