Ureteral injury during abdominal and pelvic surgery: immediate versus deferred repair

The incidence of ureteral damage during abdominal surgery is <1%. Repair of these lesions can be performed immediately when the injury is detected or deferred when it has been missed.

We retrospectively reviewed ureteral injuries that required surgical repair and were made during gynaecological and general surgery procedures between the years 2004 and 2016. We compared the clinical and functional outcomes between immediate and deferred repair.

We registered 84 lesions after 4000 abdominal procedures (2.1%). A total of 20 injuries were noted during general surgery interventions (24%) and 64 during gynaecological procedures (76%). The approach was laparoscopic in 66 of these cases and open in the other 18. Mean time of follow-up was 24 months. Immediate repair was accomplished in 35 cases (41%) and deferred in 49 (59%), with a median time to repair of 5.7 months. The laparoscopic approach was more frequent in deferred repairs (76% vs. 16%), while the open approach was more common in immediate repairs (54% vs. 40%). Procedures used for ureteral repair included 62 ureteral reimplantations using a psoas hitch technique, 8 end-to-end ureteral anastomoses, 6 ureterorraphies and 6 ureteral catheterisations. Two nephrectomies were also performed. Success rates and complications were similar for both immediate and deferred procedures (68% vs. 73% and 26% vs. 23% respectively, both p >0.05).

The occurrence of ureteral injury during abdominal surgery is low. Immediate repair is preferred when feasible, but delayed recognition of the injury is more common. We found no difference between immediate and deferred repair in terms of success rates.