Adult hypospadias Archives - Page 3 of 3

November 11 2014

Good results of hypospadias repair surgery in adults even after previous failed repairs

Besides 100,000 kids born in India every year with hypospadias, there are an estimated 5-10 lakh adults living with either unoperated hypospadias or failed hypospadias having complications of Hypospadias surgery. These can be minor issues such as urethral fistula, chordee or suboptimal cosmetic results but a significant number may have major issues such as completely failed hypospadias, urethral diverticulum, hairy urethra, urethra stricture etc. Unable to come to terms with penile deformity, they do not get any hope or assurances from adult urologists or plastic surgeons as this may not be the area of primary interest or dedication for them.

Mr Rajveer Singh, 30 years old man, had a midpenile hypospadias with chordee and was operated by a plastic surgeon in Hissar Haryana 2 years back. After surgery, there was a breakdown of hypospadias repair and he was still passing urine from underside of penis. He was still having a downward curvature of penis (chordee) even after this surgery. Also he had seen hair growing out of urinary opening over last few months. He was very worried as he wanted to get married, hence he wrote to us asking for help. We wrote back asking for detailed pictures on email which would help us in understanding his clinical condition and hypospadias deformity. Finally, we called him to see us at Hypospadias Foundation in Kharghar, Navi Mumbai. He took a flight from Delhi to Mumbai and landed up in my Hypospadias clinic on a Monday evening. On examination, he had a urinary opening much below the head of penis in midpenile region and also a couple of holes (urethral fistula) from where he was leaking urine. More importantly his penis still looked bent due to uncorrected chordee. Lastly the cosmetic outcome was really bad with tags of skin here and there and we could see hair coming out of his urethra due to previous failed improper hypospadias surgery. This results when an undertrained hypospadias surgeon uses hairy penile skin for urethral reconstruction. We counselled Rajveer regarding the surgical plan the first step of which would be excision of all unhealthy skin tissue on underside of penis, chordee correction (straightening of penis) and then decide for the type of hypospadias repair in operation theatre. This would be either a single stage repair using a local flap from hairless penile skin or a staged repair using a buccal mucosa graft. In staged buccal mucosa graft – we first excise all unhealthy tissue and scars of failed hypospadias repair, then take a thin lining from inside of lower lip or cheek and then place it as a graft on underside of penis. Once this graft gains local blood supply from penis tissue, we roll it into a urethral tube typically after 6 months of first stage. We always keep buccal graft as the last option in failed hypospadias as that essentially means multiple surgeries. Hence, we attempt to do a single stage flap repair whenever feasible even in failed hypospadias and hence we shared this intent with Rajveer.

Rajveer was taken up for surgery the next day under spinal anesthesia and first a cystoscopy was done. It showed normal urethra beyond midpenile region and unhealthy scarred hairy urethra with fistulae in the distal penile region. We excised all the unhealthy tissues and then checked for chordee. There was still 30 degrees bend in penis which needed correction by a 12 O’clock non-absorbable stitch on the top side of penis. On rechecking with artificial erection, there was no chordee now. After chordee repair was satisfactory, we analysed the penile skin on the right side of penis. We could see an island of hairless skin which was possibly remnant of foreskin (prepuce). We designed a long flap from this with very good blood supply from the underlying dartos tissue. This flap was used in an onlay fashion to repair hypospadias in a single stage. Finally head of the penis (glans) was also repaired and a catheter was placed to drain urine till the whole repair healed. Rajveer went back to his home town in Haryana after 3 days of surgery and then we arranged for one of my surgeon colleagues in Hissar (Dr Vivek Gupta) to help with post hypospadias surgery care. The catheter was removed on day 14 since it was a major hypospadias reconstruction. Rajveer passed urine well and but the full healing of the penis took about 4 weeks. The final cosmetic result was excellent when he sent the pictures via email. He visited us recently almost 3 months after surgery, the penis looked well healed and he is passing urine well from the tip in a good stream. His erections are straight and he is now looking forward to get married. The only question is whether he will invite me for his wedding or not and if he invites, how will he introduce me.

When such complex failed cases do well after hypospadias treatment at Hypospadias foundation, it makes us very happy. We feel our goal of starting the foundation in Nov 2008 has been fulfilled. Last six years have been a long and exciting journey but is has been a very challenging time. When we started we never knew the burden of problem was so high. Along the way we have been privileged to be a part of lives of more than 600 kids and adults with Hypospadias from all over India and some countries abroad. Almost 25% of those receiving treatment at Hypospadias Foundation, have been patients with failed hypospadias who received surgery elsewhere. Though initially we started only with management of hypospadias in children but we realized that there is huge gap when it comes to treatment of hypospadias in adults. Along with Dr Manish Dubey, my close friend who is an adult urologist we are able to offer good care and success rates in adults and failed hypospadias.

In last three years, Hypospadias Foundation has welcomed many patients from many other states and countries such as Nepal, Bangladesh, Greece, Afghanistan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, UAE-Dubai, Oman, Great Britain (UK), USA, Nigeria, Tanzania, Kenya, Congo, Zambia and this number continues to grow attesting to our devotion to the field of Hypospadias. Within India, kids and their families have travelled for treatment of hypospadias from Assam, Kolkata, Orissa (Puri, Bhubhaneshwar), Ranchi, Chattisgarh (Raipur, Katni), Gujarat (Ahmedabad, Surat, Baroda, Gandhinagar), MP (Indore, Bhopal), Himachal, Delhi, Haryana (Hissar, Rohtak, Panipat), Rajasthan (Bikaner, Jaipur, Jodhpur), Maharashtra (Jalgaon, Pune, Aurangabad, Nasik, Nagpur, Parbhani, Dhule, Solapur, Kolhapur, Ahmednagar, Ratnagiri), Uttar Pradesh (Lucknow, Allahabad, Meerut), Goa, Andhra Pradesh (Hyderabad, Belgaum, Guntur), Uttarakhans (Dehradun), Jammu, Kerala (Cochin), Tamilnadu (Chennai, Salem, Coimbatore) and Punjab (Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Patiala).

About the author:

Dr A.K.Singal is a Pediatric Urologist and Hypospadiologist practicing in western india in area of Navi Mumbai and Thane. He is counted as one of the best hypospadias expert surgeons in the world and every year manages more than 200 kids and adults with hypospadias. He is available at the following clinics :

Clinics and Appointments for Dr Singal

To send an enquiry to Dr Singal’s team please fill up this form: Contact Dr A.K.Singal

Watch video of Single stage repair surgery of severe hypospadias by Dr A.K.Singal

Watch video of repair of glanular hypospadias with chordee by Dr A.K.Singal

Watch video of Distal penile hypospadias repair surgery by Dr A.K.Singal

Contact Form for Hypospadias Foundation

Please fill all clinical details and upload pictures and clinical summaries (if available)

January 01 2014

Living with Hypospadias- Adults with hypospadias

The tale of hypospadias does not stop in first few years of life for everyone. This is especially true of adults and adolescents who underwent hypospadias surgery repair using older techniques and with lesser trained Hypospadias surgeons 15-20 years back. While a majority of these have done well, there is a sizable population of adults in India who have persistent issues secondary to hypospadias such as urethral fistulas, persistent penile chordee (bending of penis), urethral stricture or bad cosmetic outcome. As Pediatric urologist and a surgeon with deep interest in hypospadias (hypospadiologist), we keep seeing such patients on a regular basis now.

There are atleast estimated 5 lakh adults/ adolescents in India with untreated, complicated or residual issues of hypospadias in India. Some of these people live an unsatisfied life thinking that no cure is possible because that is what they have been brought up to think. Individuals who have failed multiple surgeries are called Hypospadias cripples in medical community signifying the crippling effect which inadequately treated hypospadias can have in a person’s life.

Fortunately, with newer techniques, better hypospadias surgery instruments, very good sutures like PDS, availability of dedicated hypospadias surgery teams and expert hypospadias surgeons good results are possible in any patient with previous failed hypospadias surgery even in hypospadias cripples.

Here is story in point:

Six months back I saw Mr RK, a 30 year old young man, who had been a case of failed hypospadias – operated for hypospadias twice in his childhood in a hospital in Delhi. Both the surgeries had met with partial success and his parents had left him like that and lost hope at a completely functional urethra. RK had been a good student and went on to do Engineering graduation from IIT and then a MBA from Pune. He had taken up a job in multinational company and now was planning to get married. Infact, he had delayed marriage inspite of a successful career because he was never satisfied with outcome of his hypospadias surgery. That’s why he looked up on internet and came to see us at Hypospadias Foundation in Navi Mumbai.

At the first consultation itself and being in relatively the same age group, we hit it off really well and he was quite frank and objective about his condition and that kind of interaction helps a hypospadias specialist like me. When I examined him, he had a persistent mild chordee but the bigger issue was his urinary opening (meatus) was not on the tip of penis (glans penis) but way down in distal penile location. He had many skin bridges and scarred islands of skin and a large urethral fistula in proximal penile region. There was a bit of penoscrotal transposition as well. On questioning, he was passing 50% of the urine from the urethral fistula and 50% from the distal penile location without any straining and in good urinary stream. None of these problems were major by themselves and could have been cured easily but after two failed hypospadias repairs in childhood, I think parents just gave up hope.

So we discussed with RK at length about the various things which needed to be done-

Distal urethroplasty using flap from nearby ventral penile skin,
Closure of urethral fistula (fistula repair) in multiple layers with tunica vaginalis flap
Correction of penoscrotal transposition
And chordee correction by dorsal plication.

The surgery was done next week at MITR Hospital & Hypospadias Foundation. Dr Manish Dubey, Urologist and Co-founder of Hypospadias Foundation helped me with the surgery and management immediately post surgery. RK was sent home the day after surgery. A follow up visit for hypospadias dressing removal was planned on day 5 and catheter removal o day 10.

Some of things especially in adults undergoing hypospadias surgery, which we took care of to ensure smooth recovery and are different from children:

Postoperative pain and erections
Choosing the right urethral catheter and drainage bag

We were also worried about higher chances of wound infection and bleeding after redo-hypospadias repair. For pain and prevention of erections we gave benzodiazepine derivative tablets and phenobarbitone along with diclofenac and that helped pretty well for two weeks. For the catheter, we used a Foleys silicon catheter for 10 days and left it to drain in a urine bag which RK could carry with him and walk around within his home.

Fortunately, everything went well and now after 3 months of hypospadias surgery, the hypospadias surgery site is healing well and there is no more pain during erections. The urine stream is good and RK is passing from the tip of his penis for the first time in his life standing like a normal man. He is not shy to use the public toilets anymore- He just stands up and delivers.

We have asked him to wait for three more months before planning marriage and these three months he is actually going to spend in finding the right girl for himself. For him, we hope the chapter of HYPOSPADIAS is closed now.

The only question remains whether as a Hypospadiologist I will get invited to his marriage- if yes, how will he introduce me? As the doctor who fixed his penis? I think that is too much and I will just skip attending his marriage and I wish him the best of luck always from our side and from everyone at MITR hospital and Hypospadias Foundation in Navi Mumbai, India.

Contact Form for Hypospadias Foundation

Please fill all clinical details and upload pictures and clinical summaries (if available)

September 09 2012

Hypospadias in Adults- Setting the right goals and expectations

I get a lot of enquiries about hypospadias through our Hypospadias foundation website – Most of these are from concerned parents, sometimes from relatives, sometimes from referring doctors but rarely from patients themselves. For writing about themselves, the patients have to be old enough to go on Internet and seek help. And with advancing awareness, these days most of the kids are referred to me in first few months of age and sometimes even in newborn age. So to get an inquiry from a patient happens only a couple of times in a month. And most of these are enquiries before an impending marriage!

I was intrigued when I got an email from a VK 34 years old man wanting to consult me for hypospadias. My assistant, Akshay, explained to him about my consultation time at MGM vashi and at Mitr hospital.

On Monday evening, VK wrote to me again saying that he went to MGM Vashi but they refused to make a file for him and sent him back with the explanation that Dr Singal treats only kids till 15 years of age. I felt really bad and I sent an email back to him and asked Akshay to schedule an out of turn consultation for the young man on Tuesday. Tuesday otherwise is usually my free day.

So Tuesday evening, in walked VK, a smart confident young man. He was working as a senior software analyst in a well known consulting company and was married for last 3 years. The consultation began on a nice note. I went through all the papers dating back to one year of age. VK was born with a scrotal hypospadias and had undergone two stage repair at Wadia Hospital when he was 5 years of age, thereafter he had required a couple of minor procedures for narrowing of passage and urethral fistula but was mostly passing urine well. His main reason for consultation at this time was infertility. Secondary issue which we discussed was splaying of urine at time of passing urine. His urine came out in a form a spray rather than a well directed stream and he would often wet his pants and thus found it difficult to use a urinal for expeditious passing of urine.

His sperm count was almost normal and he was able to have normal erections and ejaculations. The ejaculate was not forceful so an intrauterine insemination (IUI) had been tried but two sessions had failed.

His secondary problem of a sprayed kind of urine stream was due to a wide open urinary meatus (hole) with a funnel kind of appearance and lot of loose skin folds around it. Also, the urinary opening was not at the tip of the penis but was rather on the underside about 3 cm from the tip.

From a functional point of view, the location of the urinary opening was not in too bad a location to cause infertility. Also, since IUI had failed, I was sure that the infertility problem was not due to hypospadias per se. Given the high incidence of primary infertility these days and advanced age of the mother (34 years), the infertility may have been because of some other factors.

In his own mind, VK had thought that it was his hypospadias problem which was causing infertility. I spent close to 40 minutes trying to draw diagrams and explaining to him that we should look for other causes of infertility. Finally, he was convinced and then I referred him to an infertility specialist and an andrologist. The plan was:

Re-evaluation of fertility status by checking all the reports of husband and wife again
Trial of In-vitro fertilization for having a child
And then repair of the hypospadias from urinary point of view once wife if pregnant.

Both for the patient and the surgeon, it is very important to have the goals and expectations from any treatment set at the beginning of the treatment itself. VK had come to me with a primary issue of infertility and the secondary issue was urinary splaying due to incompletely repaired hypospadias. By solving his hypospadias issue, we could not have solved his infertility problem and I did not want him to have any false hopes and thus get surgery done for the wrong reason/ indication. Overall, VK was very happy with the plan. I hope that he will have a baby soon and then we will fix his rest of the urinary issues in a single stage and well.

Over the last few years, our team – myself and Dr Manish Dubey have treated about 20 adults with various kinds of hypospadias and residual problems. Some of these have been for urethral fistulas, others for residual chordee or cosmetic issues. Most of these have come just before marriage or when they are facing issues such as VK. A couple of patients actually travelled from south India and one from Dubai to get treated.

Contact Form for Hypospadias Foundation

Please fill all clinical details and upload pictures and clinical summaries (if available)

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Category Archives: Adult hypospadias

Contact Form for Hypospadias Foundation

Contact Form for Hypospadias Foundation

Contact Form for Hypospadias Foundation