Changing trends in the causes and management of male urethral stricture disease in China: an observational descriptive study from 13 centres

Objective To determine whether there have been any changes in the causes and management of urethral strictures in China. Patients and Methods The data from 4 764 men with urethral stricture disease who underwent treatment at 13 medical centres in China between 2005 and 2010 were retrospectively collected. The databases were analysed for the possible causes, site and treatment techniques for the urethral stricture, as well as for changes in the causes and management of urethral strictures. Results The most common cause of urethral strictures was trauma, which occurred in 2 466 patients (51.76%). The second most common cause was iatrogenic injures, which occurred in 1 643 patients (34.49%). The most common techniques to treat urethral strictures were endourological surgery (1 740, 36.52%), anastomotic urethroplasty (1 498, 31.44%) and substitution urethroplasty (1 039, 21.81%). A comparison between the first 3 years and the last 3 years showed that the constituent ratio of endourological surgery decreased from 54% to 32.75%, whereas the constituent ratios of anastomotic urethroplasty and substitution urethroplasty increased from 26.73% and 19.18% to 39.93% and 27.32%, respectively (P < 0.05). Conclusions During recent years, there has been an increase in the incidence of urethral strictures caused by trauma and iatrogenic injury. Endourological urethral surgery rates decreased significantly, and open urethroplasty rates increased significantly during the last 3 years.