Treating Peyronie’s disease with surgery…

Why and why not?

Peyronie’s disease (PD) affects 1 to 3% of the male population and is considered one of the frequent causes of shortening of penis, penile shape deformities and erectile dysfunction. The treatment of PD, to date, remains one of the greatest therapy challenges for doctors and sexual health care experts. While various treatment options like radiotherapy, medical drug treatment (both oral medicines and injections) are available, surgery is often used to correct the curvature and shape of the penis.

The following article gives you an outline of different surgical procedures used to treat PD and also highlights different pros and cons of surgical treatment of the same.

Types of surgery for Peyronie’s disease

According to surveys and studies, three surgical procedures for Peyronie’s disease have had some success.

1-    Removal / cutting: The first procedure involves removing or cutting of the plaque and attaching a patch of skin, vein, or material made from animal organs. This method may straighten the penis and restore some lost length from Peyronie’s disease. However, some patients may experience numbness of the penis and loss of erectile function.

2-    Plication: A second procedure, called plication, involves removing or pinching a piece of the tunica albuginea from the side of the penis opposite the plaque, which cancels out the bending effect. This method is less likely to cause numbness or erectile dysfunction, but it cannot restore length or girth of the penis.

3-    Implant: A third surgical option is to implant a device that increases rigidity of the penis. In some cases, an implant alone will straighten the penis adequately. If the implant alone does not straighten the penis, implantation is combined with one of the other two surgical procedures.

In short, most of the time, these types of surgery can produce positive results. But because complications can occur, and because many of the effects of Peyronie’s disease (for example, shortening of the penis) are not usually corrected by surgery, most doctors prefer to perform surgery only on the small number of men with curvature severe enough to prevent sexual intercourse. One should also not forget the high costs associated with hospitalization and post-surgery expenses. Also, some common complications associated with penis surgery include bleeding, infection, permanent shortening or disability of penis and post-operative (after the surgery) pain.

Penis stretchers or extenders, on the other hand, are now being considered as one of the alternatives for Peyronie’s disease. A typical external penis stretching device, like that of SizeGenetics, works by allowing the patient to stretch the flaccid penis for several hours a day. The level of traction can be adjusted by adding metal sections to the length of the splint. Over time, the stretching action appears to either elongate the plaque, or cause remodeling of the tissue that has been damaged or abnormally thickened as a result of Peyronie’s disease.