A comparative study of morbidity between percutaneous nephrolithotomy and laparoscopic pyelolithotomy for renal pelvic calculus

OBJECTIVE: In this study, our objective is to compare the morbidity (up to 3 months) between percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL) and laparoscopic pyelolithotomy (LPL) in patients undergoing surgery for renal pelvic calculus in our population. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This was a retrospective study done in a urology tertiary care center from January 1, 2016, to December 31, 2018, among patients who had undergone PCNL or LPL for renal pelvic calculus. The sample size was 70, with 35 cases in each group. RESULTS: In LPL arm, there was a significant reduction in the day of the drain or nephrostomy removal (P = 0.013) and in the number of patients with persistent leak after removal of drain or nephrostomy (P = 0.048). Apart from this, the median of postoperative hospital stay was also significantly less in LPL arm (P = 0.00005). However, the mean duration of surgery was significantly higher in the LPL arm (P = 0.00001). CONCLUSION: This study shows LPL and PCNL morbidity results are almost comparable except in a few factors. However, this study was a retrospective analysis of our work and it needs high quality randomized controlled study to establish the difference among these two procedures among our population.