Hydrogel urethral bulking
Urethral bulking agents have been used for 5 decades in the treatment of stress urinary incontinence (SUI) in women. Unlike midurethral slings, in which many medical device companies use the same implant material (microporous, monofilament polypropylene mesh), the material for bulking agents has varied greatly. A 2017 Cochrane review of urethral bulking listed these agents used for this indication: autologous fat, carbon beads, calcium hydroxylapatite, ethylene vinyl alcohol copolymer, glutaraldehyde cross-linked bovine collagen, hyaluronic acid with dextranomer, porcine dermal implant, polytetrafluoroethylene, and silicone particles.14 These agents can be injected through a transurethral or periurethral technique. The review failed to find superiority of one material or injection technique over another.
New bulking agent available
In January 2020, the FDA approved the premarket application for a new bulking agent. This new agent is a permanently implanted, nonresorbable hydrogel that consists of cross-linked polyacrylamide (2.5%) and water (97.5%). It is intended to be used with a transurethral bulking system that includes a rotatable sheath and two 23-guage needles; a total of 1.5 to 2.0 mL of the hydrogel is injected in 3 locations in the proximal urethra per session. Patients may undergo an additional 2 sessions, if needed, at least 4 weeks after the previous session.
Polyacrylamide hydrogel has been used as a bulking agent in cosmetic and ophthalmic surgery for many years, and it was first approved for medical use in Europe in 2001. The initial European data on its use as a urethral bulking agent was published in 2006.15 The first North American data came in 2014 from a multicenter, randomized trial that compared polyacrylamide hydrogel with collagen gel.16 This investigation followed 345 women for 12 months and concluded that the safety and efficacy of polyacrylamide hydrogel was not inferior to collagen, with a little over half of both cohorts demonstrating a 50% or greater decrease in incontinence episodes.
Since these initial studies, 3-year17 and 7-year safety and efficacy data18 have been reported, with reassuring findings, but both studies experienced significant attrition of the original group of patients. The most commonly reported adverse events associated with the procedure are pain at the injection site (4%–14%) and urinary tract infection (3%–7%); transient urinary retention rates range in incidence from 1.5% to 15%.19
Short procedure, long-term results
Given that a urethral bulking procedure can be done in less than 10 minutes in the office under local analgesia, this treatment may lend itself to use in more brittle patient populations. One study of women aged 80 or older showed a greater than 50% decrease in the number of daily pads used for up to 2 years after initial injection.20 Another study found the greatest treatment success in women aged 60 years or older with fewer than 2.5 episodes of SUI per day.21
Platelet-rich plasma therapy
Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy has been used in multiple disciplines for more than 2 decades as a treatment to regenerate damaged tissue, particularly in sports medicine for treating tendonitis as well as in plastic surgery, gynecology, urology, and ophthalmology, and good outcomes have been demonstrated with no serious adverse effects. PRP is a natural product in which high levels of platelets are concentrated through centrifugation with bioactive growth factors, including platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF), transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β), vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), epidermal growth factor (EGF), fibroblast growth factor (FGF), and insulin growth factor (IGF).22 The activated platelets are then injected autologously back into the patient’s tissue. This process releases activated growth factors that accelerate tissue healing by stimulating the number of reparative cells to create collagen production, angiogenesis, and neurogenesis while fighting infection and downregulating the autoimmune system.
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