Speaker: It's all part of male aging enlarged prostate effects nearly every man, who reaches the age of 70. Its symptoms are hard to ignore. Listen to little boys talk. And the conversation will often turn to party humor. Fast forward 50 or 60 years and you'll find nothing funny about, a problem that effects more than 50% of men by the time they reach retirement is called Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia or BPH, but most men know it as an enlarged prostate.
Claus Roehrborn: Frequent urination, night time urination, difficulty starting the stream.
Speaker: As the prostate gland, becomes enlarged the urethra, the tube through which urine is passed is squeezed.
Jim Haskell: I hardly knew, what a prostate was except I had one and it cause problems with men.
Speaker: Men fishing for relief, sometimes turn to drug therapy.
Paul Arnold: There are different medications, which will shrink and enlarge prostate or other medications which will allow -- which will relax the prostate.
Speaker: Jim Haskell, took part in a study that looked at combining one drug from each category.
Speaker1: His prostate had shrunken from 60 to 40 cubic centimeters.
Speaker: And the numbers of trips to the bathroom shrank too.
Jim Haskell: Would I be happy to stay the way I am and till I am planted yes. I would be tickled.
Walt Zeltner: I think I had this problem for several year which is kind of getting worse as time goes by.
Speaker: While drug therapy keep some man on the right course, others turn to heat therapy that kill cells and open the prostate, though in some cases surgery may ultimately be necessary.
Paul Arnold: There's many different procedures out there to treat an enlarged prostate.
Speaker: One is Trans-Urethral Resection of the Prostate or TURP where a surgeon removes access tissue and flushes it through the bladder. Another surgical option involves lasers.
Barry Stein: All of those are minimally invasive by comparison to the TURP.
Speaker: While the TURP or TURP procedure could sometimes result in loss of sexual function or prolonged cauterization. Some of the newest laser treatments use what's called Photo Selected Vaporization. An intensed green light beam is fed via wand through the urethra into the prostate and zaps it.
Paul Arnold: It vaporizes the prostatic tissue, what that means is it goes from tissue to air bubbles.
Edward Mueller: The high heat from the laser actually coagulates the little vessels, you get very little bleeding with it.
Speaker: A week after the procedure Walt Zeltner was back on course and able to focus more on his game.
Walt Zeltner: It will make it less of the concern, being out away from facilities, and I know what the crab grass looks like.
Speaker: A gardener by day Bruce Haskins over grown prostate was effecting his night life.
Bruce Haskins: My wife and I had a double bed so every time I got up and she is a light sleeper, so it was not only effecting me it was effecting her.
Speaker: In the interest of marital harmony Bruce entered a study at the University of Vermont, testing an injection therapy from prostate.
Mark Plante: It was quite successful in terms of reducing men symptoms. So here is the device being inserted into the prostate.
Speaker: Doctors deliver a dose of ethanol into both sides of the prostate.
Mark Plante: It will break down the membranes of the cells and it'll actually, quickly kill the cells.
Speaker: Alcohol isn't the only injectable being studied.
Mark Plante: There is also Botox, there is Saline solutions, there is actually chemotherapy drugs we could consider.
Speaker: Now Bruce's night are a little more peaceful.
Bruce Haskins: Because I don't disturb my wife.
Speaker: Though many of these treatments can offer long term health and large prostate can return, but you need know is that prostate problems shouldn't have to be kept in the privacy of the bathroom.
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