Men's Health

Findings of a meta-analysis show that phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitor use is associated with a statistically significant increased risk of melanoma, but they do not support a causal relationship.

Urologist Henry Rosevear, MD, reviews his personal highlights from AUA 2017, along with a few bumps in the road.

Although theory and preliminary clinical data indicated that intraoperative regional hypothermia could improve the return to potency and continence after robot-assisted radical prostatectomy, the intervention did not have any significant benefits when put to the more rigorous test of a randomized controlled trial.

The use of robot-assisted simple prostatectomy is increasing for the management of BPH in the United States. Patients were nearly seven times more likely to undergo RASP in 2011-2015 compared to 2003-2006, after adjusting for confounders.

Analyses of data from 5 years of prospective follow-up in the pivotal trial supporting regulatory approval of the prostatic urethral lift ([PUL] UroLift System, NeoTract) show that the minimally invasive procedure remains safe and provides rapid and durable benefits for men with symptomatic BPH.

"For low-grade disease, it’s certainly worth a try because nothing is really lost. For high-grade disease, I don’t know that it’s appropriate-we don’t have the data," says one urologist.

"The nurse practitioner, nurse, and other ancillary providers who make up the urology team are an essential and valuable asset in the consideration of adding oral androgen receptor inhibitors into the office setting," writes Gwendolyn Hooper, PhD, APRN.

More than 96% of urologists surveyed said that incorporating abiraterone acetate (ZYTIGA) treatment into practice for patients with metastatic castrate-resistant prostate cancer is easy or manageable after overcoming initial barriers, according to new research presented at the Genitourinary Cancers Symposium in Orlando, FL.

Findings of a retrospective study including 1,000 men with follow-up ranging to 8 years demonstrate the long-term safety and efficacy of prostatic artery embolization for relieving lower urinary tract symptoms secondary to BPH, researchers reported at the Society of Interventional Radiology annual scientific meeting in Washington.

While close to 90% of men diagnosed with prostate cancer between 1998 and 2012 had stage 1 and stage 2 disease, more than 90% underwent surgery or radiation to treat the cancer, according to a study presented at the Genitourinary Cancers Symposium in Orlando, FL.

“From our results, the Decipher test helps reassure low-risk patients that observation may be warranted or confirm that high-risk patients need additional treatment,” says study author John L. Gore, MD, MSHS.

"As a urologic community, we should promote the use of AS for favorable-risk disease to reduce the downstream harms of screening while preserving the benefits of early detection for life-threatening cases," writes Stacy Loeb, MD, MSc.

“We believe that aggressive loco-regional resection may be worth considering in well-selected patients as a part of a multimodal approach in the management of men with node-positive prostate cancer,” says study author Bimal Bhindi, MD.

Urologists’ adherence to value-based care pathways for BPH surgery is extremely low and only modestly improved when given individualized feedback on patient outcomes, costs, and practice patterns relative to peers, say UCLA researchers.

Cryopreservation is far more cost-effective than post-treatment surgical sperm extraction and assisted reproductive technology for men with testis cancer who desire fertility preservation, new data show.

Men who use the Internet as their primary source for prostate cancer treatment decision-making are more likely to regret those decisions a year after treatment than those whose primary sources of information are radiation oncologists or urologists.

Findings of an ecologic study indicate that direct-to-consumer advertising for testosterone therapy influenced men to seek treatment and was accompanied by increased testosterone prescribing, including initiation in men without clear indications for use.

Use of 5α-reductase inhibitors for the treatment of BPH appears to be associated with increased risks of self-harm and depression, according to a population-based, retrospective, matched cohort study of men in Canada.

Participants in an outreach event for prostate cancer screening preferred education about prostate cancer prior to undergoing screening, and thought the use of an informed decision-making model was beneficial, researchers reported at the Genitourinary Cancers Symposium in Orlando, FL.

In this article, urologists Scott E. Eggener, MD, and Stacy Loeb, MD, MSc, discuss the current applications for prostate cancer biomarkers and MRI, their impact on clinical practice, and future developments.

This article discusses the current status and potential future developments in immunotherapy for genitourinary malignancies with insights from urologic oncology specialists Hyung L. Kim, MD, and Daniel P. Petrylak, MD.

This article highlights the key points of two urologic cancer guidelines (which provide evidence-based guidance) and two consensus statements (which provide consensus recommendations by a multidisciplinary panel of experts) that have been published in the past year.

While no resource is perfect, it is worthwhile to familiarize yourself with some contemporary methodology and predictive tools to help determine life expectancy in localized prostate cancer patients.

Three out of four patients with prostate cancer with an 18F-choline positron emission tomography/computed tomography–detected recurrence were potentially salvageable with local therapy or metastasis-directed therapy (MDT), according to results of the screening phase of the phase II STOMP randomized trial.

In these videos, expert surgeons demonstrate robot-assisted penile inversion vaginoplasty, single-stage metoidioplasty, and simple orchiectomy for transgender patients.

Other pipeline developments include efficacy results for a bladder and prostate cancer drug, an infertility tool to predict sperm quality, the initiation of an immunotherapy combination for mUC, and more.

Tom Wooldridge, PsyD, addresses misinformation regarding eating disorders in men.

In the arena of focal therapy for prostate cancer, standardization of management will be a key component of quality data going forward, says Scott Eggener, MD.

Phase III study results suggest that a hydrogel spacer developed to separate the rectum and prostate during radiotherapy for prostate cancer works to maintain bowel and urinary quality of life and reduces late rectal toxicity by 78% at 3 years post radiotherapy.