[Vesico-ureteral reflux in adults. Apropos of 103 cases]

Case reports of 103 adult patients operated upon for vesicorenal reflux are reviewed. The majority of the patients (94%) were women, and clinical signs appeared initially after puberty in half of these, mainly as fever, abdominal pains and pyuria. Twelve of the 25 women known to have children had had serious septic accidents during pregnancy. Only 11% had two normal kidneys, 50% having bilateral and 39% unilateral kidney lesions. Of the total studied, 70% of kidneys had corticopapillary lesions, while 35% were smaller than normal. The average length of the submucous trajectory of a refluxing ureter was 3.5 mm, 95.5% of kidneys with corticopapillary lesions having a ureter ending in a short submucous trajectory (average: 3.7 mm). Of the 156 ureters operated upon by antireflux advancement, stenosis developed in 2 and residual reflux in 9, 7 of these latter corresponding to exclusively transvesical ureteral dissections. Global efficacy was 73% for this type of surgery, with 7.5% poor and 19.5% doubtful results. Conclusions drawn from this analysis were: the adverse effects of reflux during pregnancy (one out of 2 cases), the frequency of renal lesions in adults (35% of small kidneys and 70.4% of kidneys with corticopapillary lesions), the short submucous portion of these ureters--its length did not exceed that found in children with reflux--perhaps there had not been intramural ureteral growth, and the efficacy of the antireflux operation if a wide extravesical dissection is performed before the antireflux advancement procedure itself.