OBJECTIVE: The present work describes our experience in surgical correction of stress urinary incontinence, comparing both the TVT and the TVT-O techniques. METHOD: Between October 2001 and March 2004, 76 patients underwent the TVT procedure. Between January 2004 and January 2005, 98 surgical corrections of urinary incontinence were carried out using the TVT-O technique. RESULTS: Median operative time was 28 minutes for TVT and 7 minutes for TVT-O. Intraoperative complications for TVT occurred in 4 patients (6.6%): urinary bladder perforation in 3 patients (5%, p = 0.0228) and parietal peritoneum perforation in 1 case (1.6%). No intraoperative complications took place during TVT-O. Immediate postoperative complications: transient urinary retention in TVT, 2 cases (2.6%) and overcorrection in TVT-O (1%) which was readjusted within 24 hours. There were no late complications after TVT. There were 2 cases (2.04%) with late complications in TVT-O. TVT and TVT-O resulted in correction of incontinence in 100% of the patients. CONCLUSION: TVT and TVT-O are two effective techniques for the correction of stress urinary incontinence. TVT-O would seem to be a technique much easier to perform resulting in less intraoperative complications.