Complications of Urethral Injury

Abstract

Before the first use of urinary drainage techniques such as suprapubic cystostomy and antegrade-retrograde railroading of perineal catheter into the bladder by Verguin in Toulon (France) in 1757, PFUI was always fatal due to urinary obstruction and extravasation, sepsis and uremia. The PFUI mortality recorded a significant decrease, from almost 100% in 1757, to 78% in 1907 and to 23% in 1942 because of better management of the trauma with the introduction of the following advances: Early and accurate diagnosis, adequate treatment of trauma shock, urinary drainage, debridement of devitalized tissues, and immobilization of the bony pelvis. This fatality applied also to anterior urethral injury depending on the grade [1, 2]. Further improvement has been achieved nowadays with better management of associated injuries, the introduction of antibiotics, the generalized use of blood transfusions, the improvement of techniques in the stabilization of fractures, and the creation of intensive care units, etc.