The use of free grafts for urethroplasty

Abstract

Apart from isolated reports, substitution urethroplasty really began in the 1940s with Humby [1]. He used fullthickness skin grafts for urethral reconstruction, hypospadias, and urethral strictures and also described the first recorded case of buccal mucosal graft urethroplasty. After him, sporadic cases were reported in the British, European, and American literature. By the mid-1960s grafts were in regular use for urethral reconstruction for both hypospadias and strictures. The foremost proponents were Devine and Horton from Norfolk, Virginia, USA [2]. They and others continued with graft repairs into the 1970s, but by then Yaxley [3] and others began developing flap repairs. Most notable were Turner-Warwick [4] and Blandy [5] for the repair of urethral strictures in adults and Duckett [6] for the repair of hypospadias in children.