What are conditions that affect the prostate?

Prostate cancer, a malignant cancer, is the second most frequent cause of cancer death in men age 65 to 75. This year more than 38,000 men in the United States will die from the disease. Prostate cancer begins growing in the prostate and can spread throughout the body. Symptoms include difficulty with urination, frequent urination, and urgency with urination.

Benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH) is nonmalignant growth of the prostate that naturally occurs with age, often as early as age 40, but manifesting symptoms in 30 percent of men by age 65.
Listed in the directory below you will find some additional information regarding prostate problems, for which we have provided a brief overview. If you cannot find the condition in which you are interested, please visit the Information Resources page for an Internet / World Wide Web address that may contain additional information on that topic.

Prostatitis is an inflammation or infection of the prostate gland. It is a very common disorder. In fact, it is the most commonly diagnosed urologic disease in men. About 50% of adult men in the United States will be treated for prostatitis during their lifetime.

What are common problems associated with treatment of the prostate?

Impotence/Erectile Dysfunction - Impotence, or erectile dysfunction, is the inability to achieve an erection, and/or dissatisfaction with the size, rigidity, and/or duration of erections. Erectile dysfunction affects millions of men. Although in the past it was commonly believed to be due to psychological problems, it is now known that 80 to 90 percent of impotence is caused by physical problems, usually related to the blood supply of the penis. Many advances have occurred in both diagnosis and treatment of erectile dysfunction.

Urinary incontinence (UI) is the loss of urine control, or the inability to hold your urine until you can reach a restroom. More than 13 million people in the United States experience incontinence - male and female (women are twice as likely to develop UI than men), young and old. Urinary incontinence may be a temporary condition, resulting from an underlying medical condition. It can range from the discomfort of slight losses of urine to severe, frequent wetting.