An improved system of bladder drainage

We report the successful use of a modified No. 8 infant feeding tube for po stoperative bladder drainage in 100 gynaecological patients after surgery. In previous years, problems arising from the use of trans-urethral postoper ative catheter drainage led to the use of various types of suprapubic cathe ter drainage after gynaecological surgery. However, this method of catheter drainage still carries the risk of complications, and many surgeons have p referred to persist with trans-urethral bladder drainage. Several authors h ave described the postoperative use of a small diameter transurethral feedi ng tube so as to enable the patient to void around the tube, thus avoiding the risks of repeated reinsertion of a catheter if there is delay in reesta blishment of normal voiding. The simplicity of this method and its low cost encouraged us to carry out a trial of the method and we have introduced so me modifications to improve the technique. Our experience of the method and the positive comments from nursing staff a nd patients have led us to adopt it for most of our postoperative gynaecolo gical patients and we believe it deserves wider use.