Re: Randomized Controlled Trial Comparing Three Different Modalities of Lithotrites for Intracorporeal Lithotripsy in Percutaneous Nephrolithotomy (From: York T,Borofsky MS,Chew BH,et al. J Endourol 2017;31:1145–1151)
Available accessLetterFirst published online March, 2018
Re: Randomized Controlled Trial Comparing Three Different Modalities of Lithotrites for Intracorporeal Lithotripsy in Percutaneous Nephrolithotomy (From: York T,Borofsky MS,Chew BH,et al. J Endourol 2017;31:1145–1151)
We read with great interest the article by York et al.1 entitled “Randomized controlled trial comparing three different modalities of lithotrites for intracorporeal lithotripsy in PCNL.” This study showed that the safety and efficacy of Cyberwand, Lithoclast Select, and the StoneBreaker lithotripters are similar and comparable. They stated that “the clearance rate of ‘hard’ stones (defined as brushite, cystine, and uric acid stones) was comparable across the three groups”. We would like to point out that this statement is one side of the coin. It is possible that the clearance rate of “soft” stones was different. This article did not perform analysis between “soft” stone compositions. Previous studies with higher sample size showed that stone composition is an important factor that affect stone clearance rate of different types of lithotripters.2 Furthermore, we want to make a minor criticism of this study: the low sample size of this study may be responsible for this nonsignificant finding.
References
1.
YorkNE, BorofskyMS, ChewBH, et al.Randomized controlled trial comparing three different modalities of lithotrites for intracorporeal lithotripsy in percutaneous nephrolithotomy. J Endourol, 2017; 31:1145–1151.
2.
RadfarMH, BasiriA, NouralizadehA, et al.Comparing the efficacy and safety of ultrasonic versus pneumatic lithotripsy in percutaneous nephrolithotomy: A randomized clinical trial. Eur Urol Focus, 2017; 3:82–88.
