What is Prostate Gland?
The prostate is a walnut size gland, that plays an important role in male reproductive system as a vital part and its position is near to bladder and covers the male urethra. When people become older, then it turns to increase the size which causes different health related problems, but no need to worry too much regarding thinking about prostate cancer as, not all prostate problems shift to cancer.
Recently, Prostate problems are very common issues among men, although, its more prone to American-African people than the other parts of the universe. In addition to this, if anyone father or brother identified by prostate cancer, or eat the fatty foods for a long time or reach the age above 50, then that person is more likely to grow the prostate problems.
Types of prostate problems:
There are several types of prostate problems (Prostatitis):
· Benign prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH): This type of prostate problem is called noncancerous tumor in which an enlargement of prostate gland observes after the age 40, mainly increase the size of prostate with age rising.
· Prostate cancer: This is the topmost serious problem among all the prostate related problems that causes growing of cancer cell inside or outside of prostate gland. Due to having asymptomatic criteria and late-stage diagnosis of this problem, people are dying more and more as cancer cell is spreading quickly as well as becoming mortal nowadays, though, prostate cancer is readily treatable in case of early diagnosis.
· Chronic pelvic pain syndrome (CPPS) or chronic prostatitis: This is the most common form of prostate problem which can appear in different area of body such as scrotum, penis tip, groin area, lower back etc. Sometimes, inflammation, irritation, even painful ejaculation for men can occur for this problem.
· Acute Bacterial Prostatitis: This happens due to bacterial infection for a short period of time when bacteria enter into the prostate. In case of affecting, some may face pain, fever and chilling sensation.
· Chronic Bacterial Prostatitis: This one is also caused by bacterial infection. Although, symptoms are mostly common in association with both acute and chronic bacterial prostatitis, patients suffer from long time with some symptoms, for examples, Burning or irritating sensation, blood in the urine, frequent irritation, UTI (Urinary tract infections). Along with this, affected people need long time to treat with antibiotics for the chronic prostatitis as this infection comes repeatedly.
· Asymptomatic Inflammatory Prostatitis: Without revealing any symptoms, one prostate problem may show which is only identified by health care professional, known as asymptomatic inflammatory prostatitis.
Symptoms:
Due to the amplification of prostate gland, the following symptoms may appear:
· Frequent urination
· Irritation or Pain during micturition
· Urinary tract infections
· Erectile dysfunction
· Urine can come out outside like drop by drop (Dribbling)
· Unable to empty the bladder
· Cause stone formation in bladder or kidney
· Unable to urinate
· Blood can present inside the urine (Gross hematuria) or semen
· Often pain in the lower back, hips, groin area, pelvic and thighs, rectal area
Diagnosis:
For ensuring the prostate problems, Doctor normally checks up the previous history, observes symptoms carefully related to prostate problems, suggests to continue some medications for watchful waiting, and finally, if necessary, recommends the patient to do the following tests-
· Digital rectal exam
· Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA)
· Urinalysis (Urine test)
· Urinary flow test
· Postvoid residual volume test
· MRI scan
· Cystoscopy
· Ultrasound exam (Transrectal Ultrasound)
· Prostate Biopsy
· Urodynamics and pressure flow assessment
Treatment:
There are numerous treatment’s approaches for prostate-related problems based on the size of the prostate, age, severity etc. These are:
· Watchful waiting or active surveillance: At first, Health care provider takes time to observe the disease condition either it become worsen or not, before treating with any medications.
· Medications: Tadalafil, Alpha blockers (alfuzosin, doxazocin, tamsulosin, silodosin), 5-alpha reductase inhibitors (finasteride and dutasteride), combination of both the alpha blockers and 5-alpha reductase inhibitors are normally used to treat prostate problems, nonetheless, duration of treatment is different for individual medicine.
· Surgery, such as Transurethral resection of the prostate (TURP), Transurethral incision of the prostate (TUIP), Transurethral Microwave thermotherapy (TUMT), TUNA.
· Laser Therapy – Enucleative (e.g., Holmium Laser Enucleation of the prostate, HoLEP) Procedures or Ablative Procedures (e.g., PVP & HoLAP)
· Radiation therapy
· Hormone therapy
· Prostatic Urethral Lift (PUL)
· Embolization
· Prostatectomy