Hybrid Surgery for Urethral Diverticulum Penetrating the Bladder

Urethral diverticula have various morphological patterns, and in complex cases, a transvaginal approach can be difficult.

Here, we report a case in which a urethral diverticulum originating from the ventral (posterior) side of the urethra penetrated the bladder through the diverticular wall. A 54-year-old premenopausal woman was diagnosed with a urethral diverticulum on the ventral side of the urethra and a communicating branch penetrating from the diverticular wall to the bladder, triggered by recurrent cystitis. Surgical treatment consisted of transvaginal excision of the urethral diverticulum and laparoscopic open bladder surgery to remove as much of the fistula as possible and repair the bladder penetration.

Voiding urethrography on the 7th day after surgery and magnetic resonance imaging 1 year after surgery revealed the disappearance of the fistula, and no recurrence of the urethral diverticulum was observed.

This suggests that a hybrid approach combining the transvaginal and laparoscopic approaches might be useful for the surgery of complex urethral diverticula that affect the bladder.