Put a Penile Ring On It: Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee Answer a Listener Question About Penile Rings
Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Armor Men’s Health Hour with Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee.
Dr. Mistry:
Hello and welcome to the Armor Men’s Health Hour. I’m Dr. Mistry, your host, joined always by my cohost and office manager, Donna Lee.
Donna Lee:
That’s right. Hello everybody. I’m here today, again. Making the show great again.
Dr. Mistry:
I’m Dr. Mistry. That is my real name. I’m a board certified urologist, and this show is brought to you by NAU Urology Specialists, the practice that we started in 2007. We’ve been lucky enough to bring you this show for over a year. Thanks to our friends here at KLBJ news radio 590 AM.
Donna Lee:
…and 99.7 FM.
Dr. Mistry:
…and 99.7 FM. A big thanks to our engineers here and to our little Donna Lee sound engineer and radio producer-in-chief here.
Donna Lee:
That’s right. Thank God for Kelly and Daniel at KLBJ to fix all of the things. But I think we should visit a little story that you had to share just now that put a huge smile on your face.
Dr. Mistry:
That’s right. I got a compliment on the show from another urologist.
Donna Lee:
In a competing group.
Dr. Mistry:
That’s right.
Donna Lee:
I mean, we’re all the same. We’re all a big happy urology family.
Dr. Mistry:
We’re all on the same side.
Donna Lee:
But he said something very nice.
Dr. Mistry:
Yes, he sure did. He thought that, he was wondering if we knew we would be so popular.
Donna Lee:
Awww. And then he said it was because of me.
Dr. Mistry:
He really did say that. It was kind of like being happy about myself and like, “Whaa whaa.”
Donna Lee:
Well, you know, you deserved that cause I’m pretty awesome.
Dr. Mistry:
We are seeing patients currently in our urology practice. A lot of patients that come to see us are, I guess, somewhat surprised that I talk to you just like I do on the radio. I try to use appropriate terms, but also show you the vast breadth of what we can do for people. We believe in a real holistic approach, having multiple different types of practitioners, believing in a functional nutritional aspect of many different disease processes, making sure that you’re taken care of, you know, your urologic care is going to be a big hug to make you feel better.
Donna Lee:
Our new integrative wellness provider Shefaly, who’s a PA–she is incredible. Like I’m getting the most amazing feedback from our patients because we’ve taken wellness to a new level. And that is so awesome and exciting.
Dr. Mistry:
It’s the strong belief that, you know, everything’s connected in our bodies, including our bladder and our, you know, erections and our hormones and how we feel and what we eat and how our lifestyle is and what our stress is. And I think that if you ignore that part of a person’s health, you’re really not giving them as comprehensive of a approach as you can.
Donna Lee:
I feel like we’re giving all our secrets away to other urologists.
Dr. Mistry:
Well, you have to be committed.
Donna Lee:
That’s true. You have to be ahead of the game and put out a bad ass podcast.
Dr. Mistry:
And they only got one Donna Lee.
Donna Lee:
Hey! That’s right. Yeah. Well, there’s that.
Dr. Mistry:
Donna Lee, when people want to become patients of ours , why don’t you tell them where we are and how to get ahold of us?
Donna Lee:
That’s right. You can call us during the week at (512) 238-0762, or you can , you can send us an email to armormenshealth@gmail.com. It’s armormenshealth@gmail.com. Our website is armormenshealth.com. We also have locations all over the place. So we’re in Round Rock, North Austin, South Austin, and Dripping Springs, Texas. So if you’re listening out of state, check us out.
Dr. Mistry:
That’s right. And if you are interested in getting a second opinion on your prostate cancer, learning about high intensity focused ultrasound, spark wave or low intensity shockwave therapy for erectile dysfunction, or really just a second opinion on your hormone management–these are things that we do all the time, all over the place, and we’re happy to give you advice.
Donna Lee:
Yeah. You know, I think patients don’t know too , that we do so much of the hormone management outside of, I mean, we have patients that come in with their UTI’s and kidney stones and all that stuff. And then they realize we do hormone management. But you can start with us as a patient for just hormone management.
Dr. Mistry:
That’s right. And we have lots of patients, maybe they’re getting injection therapy at an outside clinic and having to go weekly, or maybe they don’t like to do injections anymore and want to learn about pellet therapy, or are interested in non-traditional exogenous testosterone for whatever reason.
Donna Lee:
Exoginist?
Dr. Mistry:
That means outside the body.
Donna Lee:
It sounds like a dirty word. I’m thinking of misogynist?
Dr. Mistry:
Misogynist is a dirty word, but it’s very different.
Donna Lee:
Is that not what you said?
Dr. Mistry:
No, that’s not what I said. Your questions keep us going. And we love, because that’s what keeps the items on the radio show both fresh as well as topical. Donna Lee, we have a couple of questions don’t we?
Donna Lee:
We do. Speaking of topical in a roundabout way…I don’t know where I was going with that. But we had a patient ask a question. He said he had a quote unquote “incident” with a penis ring a few years ago, and now he has pretty extreme erectile dysfunction.
Dr. Mistry:
That’s a great , uh , it’s a great question. Fortunately, fortunately, not too common. And I’m afraid that incidences like this will encourage men not to use these types of sexual accessories. Essentially, a traditional penile ring is a metal ring that is then applied to an erect penis to help maintain the erection longer. There are some that go in front of the testicle and scrotal sack and some that incorporate the scrotal sack within it. We actually had a patient this week that brought theirs in just to make sure they were using it right.
Donna Lee:
What do you do with it?
Dr. Mistry:
It was well too small to go behind the scrotum. So I was like, “Please, don’t try to shut those balls back in there. You’re just going to get yourself hurt.”
Donna Lee:
What is the optimal outcome of a penis ring? For a firmer erection?
Dr. Mistry:
So that you can keep a firm erection longer. The good parts about such such a device are that there’s no medicines. So there’s no systemic side effects. It can be applied immediately, and it’s ideal for patients who get a rigid erection, but then can’t keep it. They’re inexpensive. You can travel with them. So there’s all sorts of great things. Most commonly when you visit a urologist, we use these penile rings that are, they’re like rubberized, and they’re placed after an erection is induced using a vacuum erection device or VED. The VED uses the vacuum to bring blood into the penis, and then you use this ring to keep the blood in the penis and it can work very well. For some people it’s not comfortable, the ring can be too tight. For some men, the ring’s too loose. A lot of times you won’t ejaculate when you have the ring on, because it also compresses the urethra, so that can be off putting to some people. But by far and away, it’s a very commonly used when properly used…
Donna Lee:
Why can’t you just use like a zip tie? Do you have to go buy a ring?
Dr. Mistry:
It’s really taking the zip tie off–that’s the problem. You got a pair of scissors under there .
Donna Lee:
What about scissors?
Dr. Mistry:
No.
Donna Lee:
What about a twist tie?
Dr. Mistry:
Unless you are, unless you are a board certified urologist, please keep all sharp objects away from your phallus.
Donna Lee:
Sounds cheaper.
Dr. Mistry:
Sounds cheaper.
Donna Lee:
You’re only have 20 twist ties for a dollar.
Dr. Mistry:
It’s just a copay. It’s just a copay. Usually when people experience an injury from one of these things, it’ll be something like where they fall asleep with it on and have the erection maintained. And then when that happens, the increased blood flow to the penis, as well as a decrease in the arterial blood flow…so the arteries bring in fresh blood that keeps the penile tissues healthy, and the veins take blood away. When we get an erection, the artery is still pumping a little bit into the penis, but the venous outflow is blocked. When you use a ring, you’re augmenting that venus blockage. So there’s, there’s no more blood coming out of the penis, but you also inhibit the blood flow going into the penis. So I would not recommend leaving one on for more than 30 minutes to an hour, and then making sure you take it off after you’re done, because if you keep the penis without any arterial blood flow, you could cause permanent damage. And in this particular case, there’s two types of damage that we see. One is that if you leave it on too long, the erectile bodies are no longer healthy and they can’t support the arterial blood flow in. But also you get something called venous outflow damage–the very things that are supposed to keep the blood in the penis no longer function, those valves get blown out because of the excess pressure. And so, depending on what this listener’s specific complaint is either he’s not getting a rigid erection to begin with, or he’s getting one and losing it quickly. If he’s not getting one to begin with, then it’s an arterial inflow issue. Hopefully something like Viagra, something like spark wave therapy with…
Donna Lee:
He did say Viagra is not working anymore.
Dr. Mistry:
Yeah. And so spark wave therapy to help rejuvenate the erectile bodies, something like that may work. But if he’s getting one and then it goes away, then ironically, we have to give him a penile ring to help keep it in there. And so , that would be the kind of the kind of interventions we have. We’re very fortunate here to have an amazingly comprehensive ED program. If the pills aren’t working anymore, we have something called intracorporeal shock, injections. And we have Dr. Chris Yang , a fellowship trained urologist in prosthetics who can do an inflatable penile prosthesis.
Donna Lee:
That’s right. He has a thousand years of training.
Dr. Mistry:
These things may not be things you want to hear, but we do have a solution for you that’s going to help you regain a satisfactory sexual life. And that’s a real big part of what we want to make sure that we provide here.
Donna Lee:
At my age though, keeping a erection longer sounds terrible.
Dr. Mistry:
Donna Lee, that is a personal problem that you have.
Donna Lee:
I’ve got dishes to do. I don’t know why I have to keep telling you this.
Dr. Mistry:
Well, I got to tell, I got to tell your husband to do the dishes so that way you got no excuses.
Donna Lee:
Dammit. No, don’t tell him.
Dr. Mistry:
That’s the problem. If he keeps doing the laundry in the dishes, you don’t have any excuses.
Donna Lee:
Okay . Well, he’s not listening to this segment for sure. How about that?
Dr. Mistry:
So if you have a similar problem or , and you want to ask us a question, please do so. If you want to come see us, we welcome you to our practice, we have space for you. We have a real interest in taking care of you. And I think you’re going to find our approach to be both comprehensive, as well as unique in kind of the variety of services that we provide. So Donna Lee, how do people become patients of ours?
Donna Lee:
And clearly we’ll talk about anything. So dont’ be shy!
Dr. Mistry:
We’ll talk about anything, that’s right. We’ll talk about anything.
Donna Lee:
We want to help you. So don’t be shy.
Dr. Mistry:
We also have a sex therapist on staff.
Donna Lee:
That’s right. And she’ll talk about anything!
Dr. Mistry:
So if you think, if you think that your problem is primarily psychological, then we can, we can address that as well.
Donna Lee:
That’s right. You can call us during the week at (512) 238-0762, or you can send an email that comes directly to me and I will answer them all. I’ll also send you a link to the podcast if you missed the answer to your specific question. It’s armormenshealth@gmail.com. That’s armormenshealth@gmail.com. And we are in Round Rock, North Austin, South Austin , and Dripping Springs. Thanks so much, Dr. Mistry!
Dr. Mistry:
Thank you, Donna.
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The Armor Men’s Health Hour will be right back. If you have questions for Dr. Mistry,, email him at armormenshealth@mail .com .