In the article by Tritschler et al. (1), with its list of therapeutic alternatives to treat long urethral strictures with a free graft, total urethral replacement by using the umbilical cord vein should definitely be mentioned. In several male trauma cases, total or partial replacement of the urethra with human umbilical cord vein, harvested in the peripartum period or cryopreserved, was done successfully, without any graft rejection reaction (lowest antigen presentation) (2).
In longer urethral strictures, but also in those that are extremely narrow, partial or total replacement of the urethra by means of transplanting embryonic umbilical cord veins has yielded excellent long-term results, especially in patients with longer strictures, after the umbilical cord vein had already been tried and tested as a ureteric replacement in clinical use.
References
- 1.Tritschler S, Roosen A, Füllhase C, Stief CG, Rübben H. Urethral strictures—etiology, investigation and treatments. Dtsch Arztebl Int. 2013;110(13):220–226. doi: 10.3238/arztebl.2013.0220. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- 2.Klippel KF, Hohenfellner R. Nabelschnurvene als Nierenbecken und Harnleiterersatz: Erstmalige klinische Anwendung. Aktuelle Urologie. 1983;6 [Google Scholar]