URETERAL STENTS - EXCHANGE UNDER FLUOROSCOPIC CONTROL AS AN EFFECTIVEALTERNATIVE TO CYSTOSCOPY

From September 1991 to February 1993, in 83 patients (74 women and nin e men, aged 24-86 years), 166 double-J ureteral stents (initially plac ed to treat fistulas or stenoses located within the inferior third of the ureter) were exchanged during 127 procedures. Stents were extracte d from the bladder through the urethra under fluoroscopic monitoring b y using a lasso made of a 0.018-inch guide wire and a 7-F catheter. Th en a new stent was placed over a 0.035-inch guide wire that had been p reviously coiled in the renal pelvis. Exchange was successful in 161 ( 97%) of 165 stents.