AB64. Research & development of automatic vacuum therapy device for penile rehabilitation

Abstract: Prostate cancer is the most common solid-organ cancer in men and one of the leading causes of death. Radical prostatectomy is the gold standard for the localized cases. Unfortunately, radical prostatectomy is associated with erectile dysfunction and penile shrinkage even under cautious cavernous nerve preservation. To improve the patients’ quality of life and the acceptance of the radical prostatectomy, penile rehabilitation after radical prostatectomy is now widely applied in clinical practice. Currently, penile rehabilitation methods include the use of phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitors, intracavernosal injection/intraurethral suppository, the vacuum erectile device, or combination therapy. Vacuum therapy utilizes negative pressure to distend the corporal sinusoids and to increase blood inflow to the penis. Clinical data indicated that vacuum therapy is the only penile rehabilitation method that may preserve penile length, improves patient and partner sexual satisfaction, and allows earlier return of spontaneous erection. However, its mechanism is obscure and its regimen is not based on scientific evidence instead on empirical knowledge. To explore the underlying mechanism of vacuum therapy after radical prostatectomy, a rat-specific vacuum erectile device was designed and applied to the bilateral cavernous nerve crush rat model. A serial of articles were published and based on these scientific data, an automatic vacuum device is being developing by our group.

Keywords: Automatic vacuum therapy; penile rehabilitation; prostate cancer