Surgeon experience with penile fracture

The experience of a single surgeon with a series of 34 penile fractures, including 29 corrected surgically and 5 managed conservatively, at 3 large inner city medical centers in an 11-year period is presented. Standard diagnostic and therapeutic modalities are described that have evolved with time.

Between 1989 and 1999, 34 patients 18 to 38 years old (mean age 27 at presentation) were evaluated after blunt trauma to the erect penis. The interval from injury to presentation was between 6 and 72 hours. Of these patients 32 and 2 had been injured during sexual intercourse and masturbation, respectively. Surgery in 29 cases involved a degloving incision, and intraoperative evaluation of the corpora and urethra by radiography or saline injection. Five patients were treated conservatively for presumed penile fracture after they refused diagnostic confirmation and/or surgery.

Injury involved unilateral and bilateral corporeal rupture in 25 and 3 cases, respectively, and urethral injury in 5. Urinalysis in 6 patients demonstrated microscopic hematuria with 5 to 10 red blood cells, although there were several false-negative urethrograms and cavernosograms. At followup 33 of the 34 patients available reported erection adequate for intercourse without erectile or voiding dysfunction, while 2 reported mild to moderate curvature.

A degloving procedure with a urethral catheter in place provides the best exposure and orientation. In addition, saline injection may demonstrate additional corporeal body and/or urethral pathology as well as assess the integrity of repair. Although surgical repair was not associated with serious sequelae, a small subgroup of patients with presumed penile fracture also had no sequelae.