PRIAPISM: What To Know And Do About That Abnormal Erection [HEALTH 101 | Medical]

Today, our health focus is on a medical emergency condition called PRIAPISM. It is a serious and painful condition that affects the penis and any man who suffers with it should immediately seek proper treatment by a qualified medical practitioner. The counterpart condition in women is called clitorism wherein the female also experiences continued painful erection of the clitoris.

I know many of the male population will be super excited to discover they can hold their “man” up for hours especially during bedroom sessions, but to briefly spoil your mood—as a “bad belle” that I am—I will like to tell you that Priapism is an abnormal erection of the penis which usually lasts longer than 4 hours in the absence of physical or psychological (e.g. visual or audio) stimulation.  The erect penis does not return to its normal flaccid state and this prolonged period of erection easily compromises the well-being of the tissues in the organ. Although this condition might see like an advantageous one when it first starts to happen to the man in question, it soon evolves into a very uncomfortable and potential organ destroying condition.

CAUSES AND SYPTOMS

The condition is most commonly caused by a combination of complicated neurological and vascular (i.e. blood vessel) factors of which you can have haematological causes like thalassaemia, sickle cell disease, leukaemia, etc. These conditions affect the structure and function of the different blood cells such that they behave and move abnormally. This makes it difficult for them to be transported round normally in the blood vessels of the penis and they then become clogged up in the organ. When this happens the blood then does not drain out of the organ as it should and it is this that causes the organ to remain erect for abnormally long periods. The neurological conditions that may cause it include any problem that affects the spinal cord be it in form of trauma (i.e. injury), infection, tumour growth, etc. The mechanism by which these conditions may lead to priapism essentially relates to defective nerve supply to the structures in the penis including the vessels. This affects the blood flow as described above leading to the abnormally prolonged erection.

Some other less common causes of priapism include side effects of some medicine e.g. anti-hypertensives used in treating high blood pressure, medicines use to treat erection problems, and some others used to treat depression. A few biochemical imbalance conditions may also cause this condition such a deficiency of the enzyme that processes glucose 6- phosphate compound in the human, this compound being the starting one in 2 major metabolic (i.e. breakdown) pathways in the body.

COMPLICATIONS

Complications of this condition if left untreated can be very damaging. These include reduced oxygenation of the structures in the organ known as ischaemia, formation of abnormal blood clots i.e. thrombosis in the blood vessels running through it, and subsequently permanent damage to the organ that will manifest as impotence or even worse still, gangrene or death of it thus requiring penis removal.

TREATMENTS

Treatment of this serious medical emergency should start with immediate attendance at an emergency room to be reviewed by qualified medical practitioners. In the case of priapism caused by sickle cell disease, the initial treatment is a blood transfusion to try and dilute the blood and release tension in the organ. In other cases, medical treatment should be commenced with orally administered drugs that help to relax the muscles in the blood vessel walls thereby allowing blood to flow freely out of the erect organ. Such medicines include pseudoephedrine, or injection into the organ of a similar blood vessel relaxing drug called phenylephrine. This latter treatment procedure should only be done by a specialist trained to do this as the medicine has serious cardiovascular side effects.

Surgical management of priapism include aspiration (i.e. drawing out) of the “bad” blood in it with a specialised needle. If this fails, a shunt (i.e. a connection) will be inserted to connect the rigid structure in the penis i.e. the corpora cavernosa to the softer part of it (the corpus spongiosum), thereby allowing blood to flow out freely. The rule here is to start inserting the shunt from the lower end of the shaft to the upper end and once

Overall, priapism can be described as potentially distressing and disabling and any man (like-wise woman) who experiences it should seek urgent medical attention to ensure no need for removal of a very vital part of the body.

Bola

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