Dear Colleagues,
This is the second issue of the UIJ being delivered on our new platform. One significant goal in this upgrade is supporting the continuous international readership growth. The UIJ is now read in over 190 countries and territories around the globe with an individual subscriber base of over 29,000 healthcare providers and researchers.
Also new in this month is the CME activity available exclusively from the UIJ, Frequently Asked Questions in the Management of Castrate-Resistant Prostate Cancer (CRPC), an expert panel interview. The faculty includes Pamela I. Ellsworth, MD, FACS, Program Chair, Associate Professor of Surgery Division of Urology The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA. Christopher P. Evans, MD, FACS Professor and Chairman Department of Urology University of California, Davis School of Medicine, Sacramento, California, USA and Fred Saad, MD, FRCS Professor and Chairman of Urology Director of Urologic Oncology University of Montreal Endowed Chair in Prostate Cancer University of Montreal Faculty of Medicine Montreal, Canada.
In the current issue, Aggarwal et al. discuss the problems inherent in using a manual paper database system to monitor ureteric stent placement and removal. Their results showed that stent removal documentation was not completed in over one third of 379 stent procedures, and follow-up revealed that 22.4% of the stents exceeded the 6-month maximum indwelling time recommended by the stent manufacturers. The authors review literature showing similar findings from other centers and discuss the advantages of automated electronic follow-up systems.
Krongrad and Lai describe preliminary results of an ongoing clinical trial. Six patients with severely symptomatic chronic prostatitis were treated with a laparoscopic prostatectomy and followed for 1 year. The patients were selected from among those who had failed every previous medical, surgical, and complementary treatment. All patients reported resolution of their symptoms following surgery. This protocol is approved by the Western Institutional Review Board and the study is listed on the searchable National Institutes of Health clinical trials Web site. It may be considered controversial by some readers and the authors acknowledge that it requires further validation. However, their results indicate that this procedure may be an option for some carefully selected patients.
Finally, the case report by Laryngakis et al. provides insight into the cause of exercise-induced hematuria. The authors used cystoscopy to evaluate a 54-year-old marathon runner with painless gross hematuria. Results revealed multiple erythematous lesions of the bladder that were associated with a small filling defect of the left posterior bladder wall. They also found submucosal hemorrhages and a shaggy prostatic urethral mucosa. The authors recommend a complete work-up (cytology, cystoscopy, upper tract evaluation) for any patient with this disorder.
Sincerely,
Karl-Erik Andersson
Editor-in-Chief
UIJ