فهرست نشریات علمی دسترسی آزاد ایران

Background: Ureteral stents are widely used in many urologic practices. However, stents can cause significant complications including migration, fragmentation, and encrustation and it may possibly be forgotten. Successful management of a retained, encrusted stent requires combined endourological approaches. Objectives: To present our experience with the approaches for treating forgotten ureteral stents associated with giant stone formation. Results: In 5 out of seven patients, the initial indication for stent placement was for urinary stone disease after open nephrolithotomy and pyeloplasty in other centers and in two patients after TUL. All patients underwent the procedure (s) under spinal anesthesia and all received antibiotics in preoperative period. The only available source of energy in our center was pneumatic lithotripsy. Conclusions: Multiple endourological approaches or even open surgery are needed because of encrustations and the associated stone burden that may involve bladder, ureter and kidney. This may require single or multiple endourological sessions or rarely open surgical removal of the encrusted stents. Although, endourological management of these stents achieves success in majority of the cases with minimal complications, the best treatment that remains is prevention of this complication and to achieve this important point designing a recall system is suggested.