Sexual health & cancer

Hello SRabb 

Welcome to the Macmillan online Prostate Community, although I am so sorry to find you here, we are a great bunch for help and advice.

So - Prostate Cancer thrives on testosterone - to stop the cancer from growing the hormone therapy removes the food for the cancer and you stop producing testosterone. One of the side effects of hormone therapy (and there are many) is ED or Erectile Dysfunction and you lose the ability to have an erection or ejaculate. Drugs such as Viagra will not work because they do not address the loss of libido or sexual desire that you have with the lack of androgens (testosterone).

There is a thread on the Cancer Chat forum dealing with sex and cancer and you may find this of help, so here's e link

 Sex and cancer - Let's talk 

I do hope the above helps - if you have any further questions feel free to ask them - it's not a taboo subject, in fact it's an important subject.

Best wishes - Brian.

Hi SRabb .

I think there is more than one answer to your question. Brian is correct that taking Viagra to try and help with getting an erection at this point probably will not be a solution. With your statistics it looks as if you have a potentially curative pathway with the HT holding things at bay until you can have radiotherapy. The experts will tell you how long you will have to stay on HT to reduce the risk of recurrence. In your case the side effects of the HT will probably be temporary - I know it is frustrating but look at it as short term pain for long term gain. In the meantime you can help yourself to maintain penile health by keeping the blood flow to the penis. There are different things available such as pumps, creams and possibly tablets but you need to speak to your doctor who might be able to give you advice or refer you to an andrology clinic. There is some thinking that if you try and keep the blood flowing to the penis from early in hormone therapy then this improves the time to recovery once hormone therapy finishes.

https://prostatecanceruk.org/prostate-information-and-support/living-with-prostate-cancer/sex-and-relationships