Uncommon Complications of Permanent Stents

Abstract

The UroLume endoprosthesis has been used for recurrent bulbar urethral strictures, benign prostatic hyperplasia, and detrusor-external sphincter dyssynergia. Complications of the UroLume have been described by the North American Multicenter Trial as migration, encrustation, hyperplastic tissue growth, in addition to pain and irritative voiding symptoms. Generally, complications have been minimal, and few of the stents required removal. Patients with bulbar strictures were felt to be at relatively greater risk of hyperplastic tissue reaction if their stricture was secondary to trauma or if they had a prior urethroplasty. On the other hand, patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia were at risk of developing complications if they had median lobe enlargement or a short (<2.5 cm) prostatic urethra. We describe two cases in which off-label compassionate use of UroLumes in the anterior urethra and in an irradiated urethra led to adverse reactions such as stent separation, poor epithelialization, hyperplastic tissue growth, encrustation, or obstruction necessitating removal.

Review on Complications and Adverse Effects of Metallic Urinary Stents

“…For urethral stents, 1551 publications matched the search criteria and two authors independently screened titles and abstracts resulting in 412 acceptable papers which were retrieved and read by the same authors. Only 118 were subsequently included in the database but only 21 papers actually reported on stent complications or adverse effects with 399 patients in total suffering 366 complications [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37] .…”