197 PROSPECTIVE ANALYSIS OF QUALITY OF LIFE AFTER ANTERIOR URETHROPLASTY

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES: Urethral stricture disease can negatively impact quality of life (QOL). We conducted a prospective study to determine baseline QOL and the change in QOL in men undergoing anterior urethroplasty for urethral stricture disease. METHODS: All men undergoing anterior urethroplasty by one surgeon at a single institution from 11/06 to 2/10 were offered enrollment. Men were asked to complete the 12-item Short Form Health Survey (SF-12) and the QOL component of the AUA Symptom Index (AUASI) pre-operatively and on all subsequent post-operative visits (1,3,6 and 12 months then yearly). SF-12 physical (PS) and mental scores (MS) were calculated according to the SAS SF-12v2.0 scoring algorithm. AUA SI Quality of Life was scored from a range of 0 (delighted) to 6 (terrible). Preand post-operative QOL scores were compared using two tailed T test. RESULTS: 51 men enrolled in the study, of which 13 (26%) were excluded because their post-operative questionnaires were not completed. Included men had a mean age of 41.8 14 years, stricture length of 4.25 2.31 cm and follow-up time of 136.74 146.44, all statistically similar to excluded men. Stricture locations were penile (n 11) or bulbar (n 27). Penile strictures were repaired in one stage with buccal graft (n 4) or abdominal wall skin (n 1) and in two stages with buccal (n 6). Bulbar repairs were either anastomotic (n 16) or buccal augmented anastomotic repairs (n 11). The overall SF-12 PS (47.44 9.91 v 48.03 11.11; p 0.91) and MS (49.5 12 v 53.2 9.5; p 0.15) scores did not change significantly post-operatively at a mean follow-up time of 4.56 months (Table 1), regardless of repair type or location. However, in all subgroups, significant improvements were measured on the AUA-SS QOL question (4.3 1.6 v 1.2 1.2). CONCLUSIONS: Significant improvements in overall quality of life were not appreciated in this study when assessed by the SF-12. However, urinary QOL, as assessed by the AUA-SI, improved dramatically, indicating that either urinary symptoms do not play a part in overall QOL, or that the SF-12 is not an appropriate tool to measure QOL in men undergoing anterior urethroplasty for urethral stricture disease.