Rickwood A M, Walker J
Department of Paediatric Urology, Royal Liverpool Children's Hospital.
Ann R Coll Surg Engl. 1989 Sep;71(5):275-7.
Thirty thousand circumcisions are performed annually in England and 70% of these are upon boys under 15 years of age. In the Mersey Region some 950 boys are circumcised each year for medical indications, the commonest being 'phimosis', which accounts for 87% of cases, of whom almost one-half are under 5 years of age. Regional practice is compared with that of our Unit, where the majority of referrals had developmentally non-retractile foreskin rather than true phimosis, where circumcisions for phimosis and for balanoposthitis occurred in almost equal numbers, and where no example of true phimosis was seen in boys under 5 years of age. It appears that in the Mersey Region many boys are circumcised for development non-retractability of the prepuce rather than for true phimosis and that in consequence some two-thirds of the operations are unnecessary.
在英格兰，每年进行3万例包皮环切手术，其中70%的手术对象是15岁以下的男孩。在默西地区，每年约有950名男孩因医学指征接受包皮环切手术，最常见的指征是“包茎”，占病例的87%，其中近一半是5岁以下的儿童。将该地区的做法与我们科室的做法进行比较，我们科室大多数转诊病例是包皮发育性回缩障碍而非真正的包茎，因包茎和龟头炎进行包皮环切手术的数量几乎相等，且在5岁以下男孩中未发现真正包茎的病例。看来在默西地区，许多男孩接受包皮环切手术是因为包皮发育性回缩障碍而非真正的包茎，因此约三分之二的手术是不必要的。
