UrethroTech UCD

Patients can be catheterised before surgery or in the post operative period whilst they are recovering. With 3 in 1,000 men admitted to hospital suffering from urethral trauma during catheter insertion, it is important that the patient is seen to quickly and a ‘false passage’ during catheterisation is avoided. Urethral trauma can be caused by damage to the surrounding tissue due to the anatomical shape of the urethra. A solution was needed in our medical device range and thus, the UrethroTech UCD was born. The UrethroTech UCD is a second line male urethral catheter, indicated for use in adult male patients who have experienced difficult or failed catheterisation which is needed to empty the bladder.

UCD Advantages

Integrated Guidewire

• The UCD is the only catheter on the market with an integrated ‘hydrophilic nitinol guidewire’ which guides the catheter through blockages in the urethra. The guidewire is ‘activated’ – made slippy -with sterile water.

Little Experience Required

• The technique of using a guidewire to introduce a catheter is called the Seldinger technique but is usually performed by experiences surgeons who manually alter a standard catheter and pass a guidewire through it with the aid of ultrasound or cystoscope to see what they are doing. UCD can be used by any healthcare professional who is trained in catheterisation with a little extra specific training and in any setting, including people’s homes. Keeping people out of hospital is hugely important to the NHS. In addition, if use in a hospital setting is required, it can be used by nurses rather than having to be referred up to more senior urology staff and take up theatre time to have a catheter placed.

Soft Guidewire Material

• The soft tip is designed to avoid urethral trauma and will turn back if the wire is pushed against an obstruction or a false passage.

‘The advantage of this, over a do it yourself guidewire catheter device, is that you don’t have the guidewire down the central drainage channel. As a result of that, it doesn’t fill up the drainage channel at the upper end which may obstruct the drainage at the eyes of the catheters. This would prevent the important sign of urine emerging from the drainage channel at the other end when its in the bladder, because that how you know it’s in far enough and therefore that its safe to inflate the inflation channel.’ – Professor Tony Mundy, Professor of Urology [source: UrethroTechLtd]

Find out more about the UrethroTech UCD here.