Urethral strictures - Symptoms

Symptoms in patients with urethral stricture disease
Patient with urethral stricture generally complain of voiding symptoms, which are experienced during the voiding phase. They consist in the following:
  • Slow stream: the patient’s perception of reduced urine flow, usually compared to previous performance or in comparison to others.
  • Spitting or sprayng of the urine stream.
  • Intermittent stream: a urine flow which stops and starts on one or more occasions during micturition.
  • Straining: which implies the need for muscolar effort to either initiate, maintain or improbe the urinary stream.
  • Hesitancy: difficult in initiating micturition, resulting in a delayed in the onset of voiding.
  • Terminal dribble: a prolonged final part of micturition, when the flow has slowed to a trickle/drible

Other symptoms may be associated to storage problems which are experienced during the storage phase in the bladder. They consist in the following:

  • Increased daytime frequency: a voiding frequency that is considered by the patient as occurring to often during the day.

  • Urgency: the sudden compelling desire to pass urine which is difficult to defer.

  • Nocturia: the individual has to wake one or more times to void at night.

Some patients may experience severe symptoms such as:
  • Acute urinary retention requiring urinary diversion using suprapubic catheter
  • Recurrent urinary tract infection
  • Perineal and/or scrotal abscess
  • Orchitis and orchi-epididimitis