Urethral plate grafting improves the results of tubularized incised plate urethroplasty in primary hypospadias

ObjectiveWe conducted a competitive efficacy trial in order to examine whether grafting the raw area of the urethral plate (UP) with inner preputial skin in children with primary hypospadias (PH) during tubularized incised plate urethroplasty (TIP) improves the results of the operation.Material and methodsFifty consecutive patients with pathology ranging from glanular to proximal penile PH were randomized into two groups, comparable for age and pathology, to be operated on either with TIP or a grafted TIP (G-TIP) procedure. Three patients failed the re-examination protocol, so the TIP group comprised 23 children aged 9.0 months–9.6 years (mean age 3.4 years) and the G-TIP group comprised 24 children, aged 10.0 months–9.4 years (mean 3.5 years). The patients were followed up for a period of 2–5 years (mean 3.2 years).ResultsWithin the TIP group, we observed the development of fistula with concomitant neourethral stenosis in two cases (8.7%), stenosis without fistula in four (17.4%), and glans dehiscence in one case (4.35%). Within the G-TIP group there was one case of fistula without stenosis (4.16%), no case of neourethral stenosis, and one case of glans dehiscence (4.16%). Two cases of non-slit-like meatus were observed in the TIP group. The results show that the complications of neourethral stenosis are significantly reduced (p < 0.05) in the G-TIP group, as is the total number of complications and unsatisfactory results. The duration of the TIP operation was 72–110 (mean 92) min, and for the G-TIP 100–136 (mean 115) min. No postoperative symptoms were observed that could be attributed to prolonged anesthesia time.ConclusionUP grafting with inner preputial skin, when added to the TIP procedure in the treatment of PH, results in a significantly smaller number of unsatisfactory results, and particularly fewer cases of neourethral stenosis. G-TIP can be used as the procedure of choice in PH patients.