After the placement of sub-urethral strips supposed to treat urinary stress incontinence, many women experience painful side effects. 44 complaints have been filed and an investigation is ongoing.
Burns, urinary tract infections, violent and chronic pain… Since they had synthetic strips inserted to stop their urinary leakage, these women have been living a nightmare. They are 44, aged 30 to 85, to have filed a complaint with the Paris prosecutor’s office for “aggravated deception and involuntary injuries”, learned BFMTV.com from the Paris park, confirming information from the The Parisian.
A preliminary investigation for “involuntary injuries resulting in total incapacity for work of less than three months” and “deception on goods resulting in a health hazard” was opened on April 20, 2021 and is continuing, we are told.
“Calvary”
Since the operation, Anne-Laure says she feels “like spikes in the crotch”, Nathalie can no longer “wear pants or move in the car” and Maria had to be hospitalized for sepsis linked to multiple infections. These women attribute their suffering to these suburethral strips and criticize the doctors who follow them for not having taken them seriously when they told them of their complications.
“I suspected that my problems were related to my strip but when I spoke to the urologist about it, he got angry”, blows Maria to the Parisian.
They also denounce the lack of information prior to this operation which has been practiced in France since 1996 and which concerns 27,000 to 40,000 French women each year. Because among the patients undergoing this procedure, many have learned a posteriori that these strips were difficult to remove.
“They explained to me that it was too risky to remove it completely and that it could no longer be removed 100%. I was shocked when I realized that I was going to have to live with it and that I didn’t I wouldn’t have any prospects for improvement. I sank,” testifies Géraldine to France Blue. Anne-Laure sums up Parisian: “Five minutes of explanations, seven years of ordeal.”
Improving the supervision of the practice
Hundreds of women victims of these side effects share their experiences in a support group created in 2017 on Facebook. Together, they have already succeeded in obtaining progress, because in 2020 the group convinced the National Medicines Safety Agency (ANSM) to impose a framework on these practices, according to our colleagues from France Bleu.
One decree of October 23, 2020 thus provides that “the placement of a suburethral tape must be taken in agreement with the patient who has been duly informed and who has been given sufficient time for reflection (…) The surgeon performing the placement must be trained in the techniques of implantation of suburethral strips, having participated in the performance of at least 15 procedures by implantation in the presence of an experienced surgeon. Regular practice is then necessary”.
However, the regulatory framework is not sufficient in the opinion of some women who are calling for the outright banning of this operation, as Scotland and New Zealand have decided to do, while North America Nord has limited the practice. If the High Authority for Health (HAS) estimates the proportion of patients prone to complications at 2.8%, the group of French victims rather estimates it at 10%.
“Should we stop relieving 800,000 women because 1,000 have complications? This is a legitimate question to which I have no answer. What is certain is that all must know the risks”, comments to our colleagues Michel Cosson, obstetrician-gynecologist. New recommendations for the management of complications should soon be drawn up by the HAS.
