The risk factors of Urethrocutaneous fistula after hypospadias surgery in the youth population

BACKGROUND: The current research aims to evaluate the risk factors of urethrocutaneous fistula after hypospadias surgery among the youth in China. METHODS: One hundred twenty hypospadias patients were enrolled in our study. All of them were defined as Tanner 4 or 5. The information collected from the participants include age, urethral operation history, urinary comorbidities before operation, urine test before operation, body temperature before and after operation, type of surgical repair, chordee degree, urethral defect length and whether received vesicostomy after surgery or not. Independent t test, chi-square test and multivariate logistic regression were performed to evaluate the risk factor of urethrocutaneous fistula. RESULTS: Among the enrolled patients, 39 patients (32.5%) developed urethrocutaneous fistula after hypospadias repair. Our result showed significant association between the group with urethrocutaneous fistula and the group without urethrocutaneous fistula with respect to age, pyuria before operation, urethral defect length and the urethral operation history. The following logistic regression showed that urethral defect length and the urethral operation history were the risk factors of urethrocutaneous fistula. CONCLUSIONS: Urethral defect length and urethral operation history should be taken into consideration before undergoing hypospadias surgery since our study discovered that the risk of developing urethrocutaneous fistula after hypospadias repair is associated with urethral defect length and urethral operation history. Age, surgical procedure, type of surgical repair, chordee degree and other factors were not obviously related to the development of urethrocutaneous fistula. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12894-018-0366-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.