Does Tamsulosin use before Ureteroscopy Increase the Success of the Operation?

To investigate the effect of preoperative tamsulosin use on the success and complications rates of ureteroscopy for ureteral stone removal.

A randomised clinical trial.

Department of Urology, Dursun Odabas Medical Center, Van Yuzuncu Yil University, Turkey, from December 2020 to June 2021.

Patients were scheduled for ureteroscopy due to ureteral stones, and were randomly divided into two groups; 67 patients preoperatively were given 0.4 mg tamsulosin for 7 days and 70 patients were not given tamsulosin. Each patient's intraoperative surgical complications, preoperative and postoperative pain, postoperative fever, need for analgesia, stone-free rate, and double J ureteral stent (DJ) insertion rates were recorded and evaluated.

A total of 137 patients, 103 (75.1%) males, and 34 (24.8%) females, were included. In 70 (51.1%) of these patients, the stone was on the right side, while in 67 (48.9%) the stone was on the left side. The stone was in the distal ureter in 47 (34.3%) patients, in the middle in 38 (27.7%) patients, and the proximal in 52 (37.9%) patients. The patients who were given tamsulosin had lower preoperative visual analog scale (p=0.02), operation time (p=0.003), post-ureteroscopic lesion scale (p=0.01), postoperative 24th-hour visual analog scale (p=0.03), fever (p=0.02), and analgesic need (p=0.04), while their rate of accessing the stone (p=0.02); and their stone-free rates (p=0.02) was higher.

Preoperative tamsulosin use increases the success of the operation and reduces complications. Key Words: Tamsulosin, Ureteral calculi, Ureteroscopy.