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PRESENTATIONPCNL in Italy.Massimo D’Armiento, Riccardo Autorino, Marco De SioClinica Urologica, Second University of Naples, Naples, ItalySummaryIntroduction: The first italian meeting on percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL) washeld in Milan in 1984. Since then PCNL has been practised in many centres but its diffusionhas not been fast.Material and methods: A Medline search using as keywords: PCNL, Percutaneousnephrolithotomy, Percutaneous surgery, was performed, time limits 1983 to 2008 to lookfor contribution of italian authors in indexed journals. The proceeding and abstract book of the SIU(Società Italiana di Urologia) from 1984 were consulted to ascertain the number of communicationspresented to the italian national congress. The number of PCNL performed and hospital stayin Italy are official data from the Ministero della Salute website www.ministerosalute.it.Results and discussion: The number of papers published by italian authors on indexed journals,although of good quality, has been poor in the past but is rising in recent years. Also from the proceedingsof the italian urological association an increase in the interest for PCNL is testify by thegrowing number of communications presented to the national congress. Of the 2555 PCNL performedin 2005 in Italy, 2513 were inpatient procedures with a mean hospital stay of 8, 11 days.Even if the number of procedures/year is increasing still there is a wide difference among differentitalian regions and PCNL can be considered an underutilized procedure.Conclusions: It is mandatory to increase the number of educational courses on PCNL to increasethe number of urologists performing this technique and in order to minimize hospital stay andto reduce the number of repeated extracorporeal lithotripsy for large burden stones and, mostof all, the number of open procedures still performed.KEY WORDS: Percutaneous nephrolithotomy.Submitted 9 May 2009; Accepted 30 June 2009INTRODUCTIONIn 1984 was held in Milan the first international courseon urological surgery and endoscopy.PCNL at that time was an emerging and promising technique,the pioneering papers by Alken on the Journal ofUrology, and by Wickham on the British Journal ofUrology being published in 1981. A dedicated instrumentationwas finally available in the next few years andhere in Milan it was the first time italian urologists coulddebate and compare their initial and limited experienceson percutaneous nephrolitotomy (PCNL). Any speakerpresented no more than ten cases in its personal series.One year later in 1985 a round table was held during thecongress of the Società Italiana di Urologia (SIU) on“Comparison of open surgery, percutaneous surgery andextracorporeal lithotripsy in the therapy of urinary stones”but we had to wait more than ten years to debate again onPCNL as just during the SIU congress of Turin in 1998 asecond round table on “the treatment of reno-ureterallithiasis” was organized.MATERIAL AND METHODSA medline search using as keywords: PCNL, PercutaneousNephrolithotomy, Percutaneous surgery, was performed,time limits 1983 to 2008 to look for contribution of italianauthors in indexed journals.The proceeding and abstract book of the SIU from 1984were consulted to ascertain the number of communicationspresented to the italian national congress. The numberof PCNL performed and hospital stay in Italy are officialdata from the Ministero della Salute websitewww.ministerosalute.it.RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONEven if PCNL is a topic undoubtfully attractive, turningover the pages of the abstract book of the SIU congresses,just one or two oral communication or poster on percutaneoussurgery were presented each year from 1984to 2000. May be extracorporeal lithotripsy was at thebeginning of our experience considered too favourably26Archivio Italiano di Urologia e Andrologia 2010; 82, 1