[Surgical treatment of stress urinary incontinence in women using a suburethral suspension with a polytetrafluoroethylene sling. Apropos of 95 cases].

Description of a new technique for urethral support which complies with the usual criteria for the efficacy of a surgical cure for stress incontinence without having any of its disadvantages. Presentation of the results, postoperative complications and of the potential role of endovaginal echography in preoperative assessment and follow up. The method can be characterized by: its safety, thanks to the vaginal approach across an operative field the size of a postage stamp, ensuring an uncomplicated postoperative period and a short stay in hospital; its accuracy in suburethral support provided by a strip of expanded polytetrafluoroethylene (Gore-tex soft tissue patch), 30 mm by 10 mm, fixed at the ends to the public insertion of the pubococcygeal tract of the levator muscles, and by its median part to the vesicourethral junction: it is of unrivalled precision, thanks to the peroperative use of an urethrometer which is introduced into the urethra to a certain determined length, either by the application of the formula: urethral length = functional length + 8 mm or, better, from a knowledge of the anatomical length measured between the meatus and the origin of the sphincteral zone during prior endovaginal echography; its efficacy, since the results are stable over time and are obtained without dysuria. These characteristics should make it a first line treatment in the therapeutic arsenal for stress incontinence.