Erectile Dysfunction (
see here) is a fairly common problem among 18 – 65 years old males. But not every case is accompanied with a visit to the doctor, mainly due to the fear of consequences and psychological (self-medicine is the most common direction individuals make use of). Words are excessive – paying a visit to a specialist for professional diagnosis and treatment is absolutely vital. These examination aim at identifying possible causes of erectile dysfunction patients and typically have nothing to do with painful tests or unpleasant conversations. When a person undergoes several diagnostic tests the nature of
the organic erectile dysfunction is either confirmed or denied; of course, the treatment directions are considered.
So how it works?
One of the most essential diagnostic steps is monitoring nocturnal erections, some decades ago a special ring was used to analyze the state of affairs, since then technology has gone far ahead.
Thus, modern specialist take advantage of Rigiscan device – a highly sensitive strain gauge that resembles a ring, attached to the penis similar to more protozoan antecedent model. Designed to track the information on the number of nocturnal erections, the device scans scans and estimates erection rigidity each time the erection takes place. Thus, if the device registers the at least one erection that lasts for 10 minutes and evaluated at 60% rigidity, a doctor will almost surely confirm the normal functioning of reproductive organ.
Still not the end of the world
However, if the test revealed the aberrations, a further investigation would be required. According to the statistics the core reasons behind the problems are insufficient blood flow to the penis or venous shunt – the process of rapid and excessive outflow of venous blood.
Determining the actual cause oftentimes starts from initiating Doppler ultrasound test to assess the blood flow rate in the vessels of the organ. This procedure implies stimulating erection for analysis purposes – the main goal is to evaluate systolic and diastolic blood flow velocity and resistance index.
Revealing the essence of violations and defining the complex of treatment measures may also demand performing a cavernosometry procedure. During this test the cavernous body (erectile penis tissue) is pierced with a needle to inject saline solution. Another needle serves as a monitoring device that scans the reaction of the pharmaceutical solution. This procedure is carried out at a last resort if the previous tests found no negative changes.
In some cases
cavernosography can be appointed, which is nothing but
X-ray, carried out after the introduction of a substance to get the full picture. This study is to evaluate the structure of the cavernous tissue of the penis and detect leaks of venous blood.
Doubtlessly, both methods are quite traumatic, and frankly speaking their share of usage doesn’t exceed 5-7%.