I has a prostatectomy 6 weeks ago at Mayo in Phoenix. Due to the aggressiveness of my cancer, my procedure was non-nerve sparing. As my surgeon put it, he did the best cancer surgery he could, meaning he took as much tissue as possible. I am permanently impotent with no hope for an errection without shots or more surgery. I am also completely incontinent when up and about, but do pretty well when at rest or sleeping. I have seen little to no improvement, but I'm told 3 months to a year may be required - if it improves at all. I use a variety of products including Tena maximum absorbancy pads, Depends, and Amazon Essentials. They all perform ok, but needing to change products 4-5 time per day is limiting, obnoxious, and expensive. Having an understanding spouse is important due to the drips, stains, smelly waste, etc. I'm very fortunate in that arena! I have started using a penis clamp during the day. It reduces flow d
and helps increase bladder capacity, but I still need to wear a pad as there is leakage and the occasional squirt. After having read many blogs and papers, it is clear that post-prostatectomy incontinence is a much more common and long lasting problem than most surgeons lead you to believe. Obviously, getting the cancer treated is essential, so there is little regret, however, I think that patients should be better educated as to the realistic probability of incontinence, that incontinence goes on often longer than expected, and in more than a few cases, it lasts forever requiring some future surgical efforts like a sling or artificialsphincter. Good luck to everyone dealing with this situation!