Erectile dysfunction following radical prostatectomy for clinically localized prostate cancer is a known potential complication of the surgery. Because prostate cancer is diagnosed today more frequently than in the past and because the diagnosis is made in increasingly younger men, there is an urgent need to develop effective interventions that preserve erectile function after surgery. In this presentation, a 51-year-old man with adenocarcinoma of the prostate underwent a bilateral nerve-sparing radical prostatectomy, after which he lost natural erectile function for approximately 9 months. The case highlights the fact that following surgery in which the nerve-sparing radical prostatectomy technique is used, between 60% to 85% of men eventually recover erectile function. This constitutes a dramatic improvement over an earlier era, when postprostatectomy erectile dysfunction was the nearly universal rule. The case also emphasizes that despite expert application of the nerve-sparing prostatectomy technique, early recovery of natural erectile function is uncommon. Many patients experience erectile dysfunction for as long as 2 years after the procedure, requiring the use of erectile aids for sexual activity during this period until natural erections recover. Corrective, cause-specific advances such as neuromodulatory therapy offer valuable adjuncts to this surgery.
Register and get free email Table of Contents alerts, saved searches, PowerPoint downloads, CME quizzes, and more
Subscribe for full-text access to content from 1998 forward and a host of useful features
Activate your current subscription (AMA members and current subscribers)
Purchase Online Access to this article for 24 hours
A, Lateral view of the male pelvis illustrating the course and distribution of the left cavernous nerve fiber, as part of the left neurovascular bundle within intrapelvic fascia coverings. The cavernous nerve travels from the pelvic plexus proximally to the penis distally, in close anatomical relationship to the seminal vesicle, prostate, striated urethral sphincter, bladder, and rectum. B, Anterosuperior oblique view of the same anatomical structures. C, Anterosuperior oblique view illustrating preservation of the cavernous nerves after bilateral nerve-sparing prostatectomy and bladder neck anastomosis to the urethral stump. The cavernous nerve fibers are preserved by division and clipping of small prostatic nerves alongside the prostate. When non–nerve-sparing surgery is required for cancer eradication either unilaterally or bilaterally, wide excision of periprostatic soft tissue includes the cavernous nerves en bloc with the removed surgical specimen.
Country-Specific Mortality and Growth Failure in Infancy and Yound Children and Association With Material Stature
Use interactive graphics and maps to view and sort country-specific infant and early dhildhood mortality and growth failure data and their association with maternal
Instructions
Thank you for submitting a comment on this article. It will be reviewed by JAMA editors. You will be notified when your comment has been published. Comments should not exceed 500 words of text and 10 references.
Do not submit personal medical questions or information that could identify a specific patient, questions about a particular case, or general inquiries to an author. Only content that has not been published, posted, or submitted elsewhere should be submitted. By submitting this Comment, you and any coauthors transfer copyright to the journal if your Comment is posted.
* = Required Field
Disclosure of Any Conflicts of Interest* Indicate all relevant conflicts of interest of each author below, including all relevant financial interests, activities, and relationships within the past 3 years including, but not limited to, employment, affiliation, grants or funding, consultancies, honoraria or payment, speakers’ bureaus, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, royalties, donation of medical equipment, or patents planned, pending, or issued. If all authors have none, check "No potential conflicts or relevant financial interests" in the box below. Please also indicate any funding received in support of this work. The information will be posted with your response.
Some tools below are only available to our subscribers or users with an online account.
Download citation file:
Web of Science® Times Cited: 30
Customize your page view by dragging & repositioning the boxes below.
More Listings atJAMACareerCenter.com >
and access these and other features:
Register Now
Enter your username and email address. We'll send you a link to reset your password.
Enter your username and email address. We'll send instructions on how to reset your password to the email address we have on record.
Need assistance?
Athens and Shibboleth are access management services that provide single sign-on to protected resources. They replace the multiple user names and passwords necessary to access subscription-based content with a single user name and password that can be entered once per session. It operates independently of a user's location or IP address. If your institution uses Athens or Shibboleth authentication, please contact your site administrator to receive your user name and password.