FEMALE EPISPADIAS: A CASE REPORT AND REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

Abstract

Female epispadias without bladder exstrophy is an extremely rare anomaly, occurring in 1 in 480.000 female population. It’s the mildest form of the extrophy-epispadias-complex (EEC), that is the most se- rious form of abdominal midline malformation (incidence of EEC can be estimated at 1 in 10.000 births). It’s imperative to diagnose this ab- normalities at birth, because that's enough a complete local examina- tion and a good patient’s past medical history, when the patient is greater, about congenital urinary incontinence and recurrent urinary tract infection. The early diagnosis, so the early treatment, is very im- portant to reduce the psychological and psychosocial problems and prevent the urinary incontinence, that’s a real problem for the social life of the patient. The pathology can be corrected by surgical recon- struction of bladder neck, urethra and external genitalia. Epispadias surgery is a reconstructive surgery and it has mainly two aims: the correction of the urinary incontinence and the reconstruct of the ex- ternal genitalia with good aesthetic appearance. In this case report we present a 3-years-old girl with isolated female epispadias, who un- derwent just one operation to correct her anomaly. In this patient the epispadias was unrecognized until 1 years-old. We reviewed, also, the Literature about cases of female epispadias that confirmed the rarity of the disease.