The Role of Antegrade Ureterolithotripsy in the Treatment of Large Impacted Proximal Ureteral Stones

The objective: optimization of approaches to the choice of endoscopic ureterolithorpsy method in the presence of large stones of the proximal ureter.Materials and methods. For the period 2017–2020 y. the study included 136 patients with large stones of the proximal ureter, who were performed one of two methods of ureterolithotripsy: rULT (group I) or m-aULT (group II). In group I 73 (53,7%) patients were operated, in group II – 63 (46,3%) patients. The age of patients ranged from 18 to 81 years, the average age was 52,7 years (54±10,5). The age of patients in group II ranged from 25 to 77 (63±10,5) years; the size of a concrement from 10 to 20 (14±3,5 mm). In group I, the age of patients ranged from 18 to 91 (63,5±10 years); the size of a concrement from 7 to 20 (12±5,5 mm).Results. The average time of m-AULT was 58,5±15,4 min, while the status of stone free was achieved in all 100% of patients. The operation ended with the installation of nephrostomy drainage in 11 (17,5%) cases, nephrostomy drainage and internal ureteral JJ-stent – in 33 (52,4%), in 19 (30,2%) cases – tubeless drainage method with the installation of ureteral stent. And the total percentage of stenting in staghorn stones of the proximal ureter, after lithotripsy and litholapaxy was 82,6% (52 patients). RULT surgery in 92% (67 patients) of cases ended with drainage of the kidney by JJ-stent, in 6 (8%) patients the operation ended without drainage.Conclusions. Analyzing the results, it was noted that the antegrade approach is a safe and effective method of treatment for proximal ureterolithiasis in the group with large stones of the proximal ureter, where the effectiveness of RULT (SFR up to 86,3±3,9%) is significantly inferior to AULT, and minimizing the size of instruments m-aULT) reduces the number and degree of complications associated with the size of the coiled tract, while providing a high level of SFR (96,8±4,4%).