Dorsovertical Lumbotomy for Surgery of Upper Urinary Tract Calculi

Yeum, Kyu Young; Kim, Kab Byung

Abstract

The posterior surgical approach allows certain operations on the upper urinary tract to be performed more rapidly, with optimum exposure and with diminished morbidity. In particular, the lumbotomy incision was excellent for open renal biopsy, simple nephrectomy for benign disease, pyelolithotomy, nephropexy, pyeloplasty and upper third ureterolithotomy. Twenty four patients underwent pyelolithotomy or upper ureterolithotomy through the dorsovertical lumbotomy approach, and the intraoperative and postoperative course were compared to the patients operated upon using the standard flank incision. Our analysis established the superiority of the dorsovertical lumbotomy incision for all factors evaluated, especially postoperative analgesic use and ambulation, hospital stay.