Management of accidental penile incarceration due to unusual masturbation practices

We aimed to discuss the unusual masturbation practices performed by methods such as penile devices causing incarceration and its emergency management.

It is a retrospective study of cases who presented to the emergency department with penile incarceration by metallic and nonmetallic encircling objects from September 2015 to October 2020. The cases were analyzed for age, marital status, motive, type of object used, duration of incarceration, associated urinary retention, type of anesthesia used, methods of removal, complications of incarceration, and secondary procedures required to treat complications.

A total of nine cases had paid emergency visit to our hospital for the past 4 years. The average age of the patients was 36.78 years. Unusual masturbation practices that underwent wrong were the common cause in most cases (77.7%). Most of cases presented after 24 hours of incident. All foreign bodies were removed under spinal anesthesia except one that was removed under penile block. Two cases (22.9%) required skin grafting and one (11.1%) underwent partial penectomy following the removal of encircling objects.

This study emphasizes that the penile incarceration because of unusual masturbation practices is rare as it is sparsely reported as only a few case reports in the literature. Most of the patients presented late because of the embarrassment associated with it. This emergency requires urgent intervention, and the method used to remove the foreign body depends on the resources available, duration of incarceration, grade of injury, and the type of foreign body.