Penis “support body” – to support the man’s “confidence”

  Erectile Dysfunction (ED) seriously affects the quality of life of men, and data show that there are about 100 million patients with different degrees of ED worldwide, and the number of patients in China is 8-10 million.  For ED, internationally recognized treatments include first-line (psychotherapy and behavioral therapy, oral medications, vacuum negative pressure suction), second-line (urethral drug delivery, cavernous body injection) and third-line treatments (penile vascular surgery, penile support implant).  Although oral medications for ED such as PDE5i have achieved good efficacy in recent years and are more acceptable to patients, they are mostly indicated for patients with mild to moderate ED and are ineffective in about 30% of patients, and can present varying degrees of side effects in some patients, and are contraindicated in some patients. The cavernous body injection therapy is suitable for some ED patients, but the withdrawal rate is high because it can lead to cavernous fibrosis and has pain and unnatural feeling. Currently, penile support (prosthesis) implantation has become one of the standard methods of treating ED in the United States. As the performance of prostheses and implantation techniques continue to improve, their long-term efficacy is much higher than that of procedures targeting the penile vasculature and their clinical use is gradually shrinking. Each year, more than 20,000 ED patients in the United States regain their sexual lives through penile prosthesis implantation.  Due to the lack of knowledge and lack of adequate understanding of penile prosthesis implantation technology, many male surgeons do not further recommend the use of penile prosthesis for patients whose first and second-line treatments are ineffective; on the other hand, China’s traditional culture and concepts often lead to the rejection of this treatment by patients and their families, and due to economic constraints, only a few dozen cases of prosthesis implantation are performed each year in China. The number of implantations in China each year is incomplete.  Mr. Wu (pseudonym) from Fujian, unfortunately, was involved in a car accident five years ago, and although he survived, he lost his erectile function due to a severe pelvic fracture. Faced with his wife, who was in the prime of life and loved him dearly, Mr. Wu set out on a long road to seek medical treatment, moving from place to place, trying various therapies but failing and gradually losing hope. After a thorough analysis of the patient’s condition, we recommended that the patient undergo penile support implantation and concluded that although the surgery was feasible, the patient still faced some unfavorable factors: 1. urethral stricture, which may make it difficult to place the urethra during surgery, making the free mark of the cavernous body unclear and increasing the likelihood of aborting the surgery by damaging the urethra; if a cystotomy was required after surgery, the chance of infection of the support body reservoir capsule would increase. 2. patient trauma The close proximity of the scrotum and anus after surgery may lead to infection and surgical failure.3 The patient’s history of penile and urethral surgery may make cavernous expansion more difficult, so the difficulty of surgery should be fully estimated. Despite the fact that almost all the unfavorable circumstances analyzed before the operation were present, the operation was eventually performed successfully due to adequate preparation. Two months after the operation, the day after the use of the support body, we received a series of smiling faces above Mr. Wu’s text message …… The penile support body has undergone a development from a single set to a three-piece set, and from non-expandable to expandable. The three-piece support body mainly includes a cylinder, suction-filled pump and reservoir capsule, which are placed in the cavernous body of the penis, the scrotum and the front space of the bladder, connected by a connecting tube. The choice can vary according to the patient’s affordability and the doctor’s experience.  Of course, penile support implantation is the last line of treatment for erectile dysfunction and is a last resort. The indications, possible post-operative complications, expected results and actual differences require full communication and communication between the doctor and patient, and should never be administered indiscriminately. It is important to know that this is a means to cure the disease and cannot be used to create a “sexual super man”.