Treatment Option For Bph: The Urolift System
Urologists at UCLA Urology are now offering UroLift, a new treatment option for benign prostatic hyperplasia .
UroLift Offers Relief for BPH
When Jeff Brenner first began experiencing bothersome urinary symptoms in his 40s, he attributed it to middle age and figured it was something he could live with.
An enlarged prostate compresses on the urethra, making it difficult for urine to flow.The UroLift Device is placed through the obstructed urethra to access the enlarged prostate.The device compresses the tissue and delivers tiny implants to lift and hold prostate tissue out of the way, thus opening the urethra. The permanent implants keep the tissue in place, like tiebacks on a window curtain.The UroLift Device is removed, leaving an open urethra for urine to flow.
Other Medicaments And Combination Therapy In Bph Treatment
Medical treatment of BPH includes both static and dynamic components . Moreover, phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors , muscarinic receptor antagonists, and vasopressin analogs may also have beneficial effects on the BPH-LUTS. Muscarinic receptor antagonists licensed for storage symptoms improvement include darifenacin, fesoterodine, oxybutynin, propiverine, solifenacin, and tolterodine. Because the effects of their long-term administration have not been clarified yet, they should be administered with caution and regular IPSS evaluation. PDE5 inhibitors may also have potential in LUTS improvement, via reducing smooth muscle tone of the detrusor, prostate, and urethra. In Europe, among the licensed PDE5 inhibitors , only tadalafil has been approved for LUTS therapy. Its administration is contraindicated in patients who use nitrates, potassium channel openers, nicorandil, 1-blockers, or have cardiovascular problems . In the case of patients with nocturia, desmopressin administration can reduce total urine volume. During its application, regular monitoring of serum sodium levels is essential to prevent hyponatremia .
Beaumont Health Offers Revolutionary New Treatment For Enlarged Prostates
Monday, July 19, 2021
Minimally invasive, water jet robotic procedure shrinks prostate while improving, preserving function
Beaumont Health is the first and only health system in Michigan to offer a novel new treatment for patients with enlarged prostates, particularly those with hard-to-treat, very large prostates.
The PROCEPT BioRobotics BPH Robotic System is a computer-guided treatment system for benign prostatic hyperplasia, or BPH. The procedure uses aquablation therapy, or small water jets, to remove sections of the prostate. Urologists at Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak began treating patients with the system in November 2020.
Beaumont now offers the most comprehensive treatment options available for patients with enlarged prostates, said Beaumont urologist Dr. Jason Hafron. The computer can actually sculpt the prostate to preserve ejaculatory function, which is not possible with the older procedures.
There are no incisions during the procedure, and it can be completed in approximately 40 minutes.
Were leaping ahead with this technology, especially for men with very large prostates, added Dr. Hafron.
One of Beaumonts first patients, Joe Rice, 67, of Waterford, had what is considered a super enlarged prostate. Where a typical healthy adult males prostate weighs 40 grams, Rices was measured at 129 grams. The procedure reduced his prostate by about 65%, or 84 grams, making it much closer to normal size with an open channel, said Dr. Hafron.
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Tweak Your Bathroom Habits
One of the simplest things you can do for the bothersome urinary symptoms of an enlarged prostate is change some of your bathroom habits.
Make sure you urinate as soon as you feel the need to go and that you empty your bladder completely each time you go. This will reduce the number of trips you need to make to the bathroom, both day and night.
Michigan Medicine offers the following tips to make it easier to fully empty your bladder when you have BPH:
- Relax as much as possible before you urinate. As we mentioned earlier, anxiety can make it even more difficult to urinate, so try not to worry about your symptoms and consider meditation for a few minutes or doing some deep breathing.
- Dont rush. Give yourself plenty of time in the bathroom.
- Consider sitting on the toilet instead of standing, to help you relax.
- Turn on a faucet or visualize running water this may help get your urine flowing.
- Read or think of other things while you urinate, to help you stay relaxed.
- Try double voiding, when you urinate as much as possible, relax for a few moments, then urinate again.
Which Treatment Is Right For Me
Ultimately, the decision of which treatment would be best for your enlarged prostate should be decided between you and your healthcare provider. Its important to discuss the process for each procedure with your doctor to determine the best treatment for enlarged prostate. Rezm and UroLift have some key similarities such as they both can be done in office, have minimal to no recovery time, and are noninvasive procedures.
Both treatments will resolve your enlarged prostate symptoms and give you peace of mind. If neither of these options seem right for you, there are alternative methods to treat BPH, such as medications or surgery.
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Your Quality Of Life With An Enlarged Prostate
If your enlarged prostate symptoms are mild and not bothersome, there’s likely no need for treatment. One-third of men with mild BPH find that their symptoms clear up without treatment. They may just watch and wait.
However, when enlarged prostate symptoms are bothersome or are affecting your quality of life or overall health, it’s time to talk to your doctor about the treatment options. Together you will determine if you would benefit most from medication, a minimally invasive procedure, or surgery.
It’s important to talk with a doctor when you begin noticing changes in urinary function. You need to find out what’s going on so you can be treated for enlarged prostate if necessary. For many men, especially those who are young when the prostate starts growing, getting early treatment can head off complications later on.
Personal And Family Medical History
Taking a personal and family medical history is one of the first things a health care provider may do to help diagnose benign prostatic hyperplasia. A health care provider may ask a man
- what symptoms are present
- when the symptoms began and how often they occur
- whether he has a history of recurrent UTIs
- what medications he takes, both prescription and over the counter
- how much liquid he typically drinks each day
- whether he consumes caffeine and alcohol
- about his general medical history, including any significant illnesses or surgeries
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What Is The Gleason Score
So, how do you know where your biopsy stands? Your biopsy samples will be assigned whats called a Gleason score, the most commonly used way to grade prostate cancer, which will help your doctor make treatment decisions.
It works like this:
Your doctor compares each of the tissue samples taken during your biopsy to normal, healthy prostate tissue.
He or she gives each sample a score, or grade, ranging from 3 to 5.
The more abnormal your cells, the higher your grade. A 5 represents the most aggressive cancer.
Once each sample has been graded, your doctor then takes the two most common scores from all the samples and add them together. These two numbers are then weighted for prevalence. This is your Gleason Score, which can range from 6 to 10, with 10 being the most aggressive cancer.
To make it super clear, lets walk you through an example.
Lets say a man has a biopsy in which 12 tissue samples are removed from his prostate.
After careful study in a lab, each tissue receives a score. Eight of the tissue samples score a 3, while the other four samples each receive a 4.
His doctor then writes the two most common scores, 3 and 4, as the final score: 3+4=7. He writes 3 first because more of the slides were graded as a 3, thus giving these readings more significance.
Questions To Ask Yourself About Enlarged Prostate Treatment
When you discuss the treatment options for an enlarged prostate with your doctor, keep these points in mind:
- How much are my symptoms bothering me?
- Do they keep me from doing things I enjoy?
- How long do I want to deal with them?
- Am I willing to accept small risks to improve my symptoms?
- Do I understand the risks?
- Am I ready to do something about this problem?
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What Is Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia
Benign prostatic hyperplasia is a condition in which your prostate grows in size.
Your prostate is a gland that rests below your bladder and in front of your rectum. Its about the size of a walnut, and it surrounds part of your urethra.
Your urethra is a tube that carries urine and sperm out of your body.
BPH isnt cancerous. However, symptoms of BPH may indicate more serious conditions, including prostate cancer.
Remedies For An Enlarged Prostate
Even if you have an enlarged prostate, that does not mean you must live with the symptoms for the rest of your life. Your doctor might advise one of several approaches to coping with BPH, including lifestyle changes, medication changes, and other treatments. The remedies and treatments available will depend on your own health situation and how disruptive the symptoms have become.
Get Sufficient Exercise
Exercise can improve with your overall fitness, as well as benefit your prostate health. Studies have shown a connection between increased physical activity and reduced risk of BPH, with exercise of any type having some degree of benefit.
Seated activities, such cycling, can put pressure on the perineum and groin. This can lead to numbness or pinched nerves. To avoid these issues, make sure you utilize a wide seat and engage in a variety of activity types.
You can also try Kegel exercises to strengthen your pelvic muscles and reduce urine dribbling. To do these exercises, squeeze the muscles that affect urine flow and then release, repeating several times to train the muscles.
Slow Down
When you head to the bathroom, make sure you slow down. When you relax your muscles and leave time to account for delayed urine and possible dribbling, you’re much more likely to completely empty your bladder. Urine that remains in the bladder because of an enlarged prostate can lead to urinary tract infections or painful bladder stones.
Reduce Caffeine and Alcohol Consumption
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Causes Of Benign Prostate Enlargement
The exact cause of benign prostate enlargement is unknown, but research suggests that hormones probably play an important role in the condition’s development.
Hormones are powerful chemicals that can have a wide range of effects on the cells of the body.
One theory is that as some men and anyone with a prostate gets older, the levels of a type of hormone called dihydrotestosterone increases, which may stimulate the growth of the prostate.
Another theory suggests that two hormones, testosterone and oestrogen, play a role. Younger men and anyone with a prostate produce high levels of testosterone and much smaller levels of oestrogen. But as they get older, levels of testosterone decrease, which means they then have a higher proportion of oestrogen in their body. It’s been suggested that the relative increase in oestrogen may stimulate prostate growth.
Effective Energetic Treatment For Enlarged Prostate
Topics in this Post
Enlarged prostate, also called benign prostatic hyperplasia , is a common condition as men get older. By age 60, about 30% of men show moderate to severe symptoms of BPH by age 80, it is 50%. An enlarged prostate gland can cause uncomfortable urinary symptoms, such as a weak urine stream, urine stream that starts and stops, frequently getting up at night to urinate, and inability to void the bladder.
There are many different treatment options for BPH, ranging from behavior medications to surgery. A minimally invasive option is bipolar enucleation of the prostate, or BipoLEP. If you are considering treatment, here’s what you need to know.
Prostate anatomy
The prostate is a small organ that sits at the bottom of the bladder. The urethra, the tube the drains the bladder, runs through the middle of the prostate.
Early in a mans life, the prostate is roughly the size of a walnut or a small tangerine. Often around 50, the prostate increases in size. For some men, this change closes off the urethra and makes it more difficult for the bladder to empty.
The prostate has two parts. The adenoma is the inner part that surrounds urethra. It is the part of the prostate that grows as men get older. The capsule is the outer part of the prostate and does not change in size over the course of life. A good analogy is to think of an orange. The orange peel represents the capsule, and the fruit represents the adenoma.
Removal of prostate tissue
Procedure
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Other Available Bph Treatments
Although Rezm and UroLift are the best treatment for enlarged prostate, they arent the only methods available to you. The severity of BPH varies from person to person, so not every treatment will be effective for every patient. Discussing the different treatment options with your doctor to identify the best course of action for you is always your best bet in finding symptom relief. Other available treatments for BPH include:
- Lifestyle changes: These lifestyle changes can include reducing liquid intake, bladder training, abstaining from alcohol and caffeine, and regularly exercising the pelvic muscles.
- Medication: There are two main types of medications used to treat BPH, alpha blockers and five-alpha-reductase inhibitors. Alpha blockers work by relaxing the prostate bladder muscles to encourage urine flow. Five-alpha reductase inhibitors partially shrink the prostate by reducing levels of dihydrotestosterone.
- Surgery: Since there are other less invasive options with a shorter recovery time, surgery is only typically recommended for patients with more severe BPH symptoms. Surgery involves making incisions inside the prostate to remove the excess prostate tissue blocking the urethra.
If youre suffering from symptoms of BPH, contact your nearest Urology Specialist of the Carolinas to schedule a visit with our incredible and experienced staff.
A New Treatment Option For Men Instead Of Medications Urolift
Urolift System for BPH is an office procedure performed under local anesthesia in less than 1 hour. It opens up the urethra by pulling the prostate away. Urolift is a one-time procedure that is very effective for the treatment of symptoms of BPH in men. Many men who take medications for BPH can instead have a one-time procedure.
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Assessing The Symptoms Of An Enlarged Prostate
To help your doctor understand how bothersome enlarged prostate symptoms are for you, the American Urological Association has developed a BPH Symptom Index. This is a brief questionnaire that asks about specific symptoms and how frequently they occur. Each answer is assigned a number — and your total is ranked on a scale ranging from mild to severe.
A score of 0 to 7 is considered a mild symptom score 8 or over is considered moderate to severe.
The AUA recommends the following treatment for an enlarged prostate based on the severity of symptoms:
- Mild symptoms that don’t bother you : If you are not bothered by your symptoms, and they don’t affect your daily life, watchful waiting is the best option for you. You should get regular checkups to make sure that you are not developing complications.
- Moderate to severe symptoms : If you are not bothered by your symptoms, you may choose watchful waiting. However, if your symptoms do start to interfere, you may choose medication, a minimally invasive procedure, or surgery.
- Moderate to severe symptoms with complications: If symptoms are bothersome and you have developed complications such as inability to urinate, you may need a catheter, surgery, or other treatment.
When Is Bph Treatment Necessary
The course of BPH in any individual is not predictable. Symptoms, as well as objective measurements of urethral obstruction, can remain stable for many years and may even improve over time for as many as one-third of men, according to some studies. In a study from the Mayo Clinic, urinary symptoms did not worsen over a 3.5-year period in 73% of men with mild BPH. A progressive decrease in the size and force of the urinary stream and the feeling of incomplete bladder emptying are the symptoms most correlated with the eventual need for treatment. Although nocturia is one of the most annoying BPH symptoms, it does not predict the need for future intervention.
If worsening urethral obstruction is left untreated, possible complications are a thickened, irritable bladder with reduced capacity for urine infected residual urine or bladder stones and a backup of pressure that damages the kidneys.
- Inadequate bladder emptying resulting in damage to the kidneys
- Complete inability to urinate after acute urinary retention
- Incontinence due to overfilling or increased sensitivity of the bladder
- Recurrent severe hematuria
- Symptoms that trouble the patient enough to diminish his quality of life
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Natural And Herbal Prostate Support Recovery In Dogs
Most pet owners will gradually see improvement in their pets condition and behavior, an indication that the treatment is working. Still, it is advised to consult a vet or holistic vet before the start of treatment, at least once during treatment, and once more when the treatment has been completed.
Owners should also be aware that positive results wont happen overnight, and that doses must be administered as indicated by a professional.
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Understanding An Enlarged Prostate
If you are a male over the age of 40, enlarged prostate is the most common cause of urinary problems. This condition is not cancerous, and does not increase your risk of developing prostate cancer.
As you age, your prostate continues to grow. In particular, tiny glands within the prostate next to the urethra swell. However, the outer layer of the prostate does not stretch enough to accommodate growth inside. This causes the inner prostate to squeeze the urethra.
When the urethra narrows, the bladder has to work harder to expel urine, and urination becomes difficult. Eventually, the bladder cannot empty completely, and there is not enough space in the bladder for new urine coming from the kidneys. This causes you to have to urinate frequently.
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