Scheduling quandary: Can I wait 3 months for my Radical Prostatectomy?

I had my RALRP done 6 weeks ago, I went out to dinner with my wife the next night. Pain meds helped cause my abs were soar. I was used to a foley catheter, last year had one in for 4 months. Overall, could not believe how well I felt the next day. Walked 5-6 times a day. My wife is an RN, works in PACu. My only advice would be to make sure you take good care of the catheter. Stay clean and something I learned from my wife. Apply some neosporin where it goes in to keep it from rubbing and as an antibiotic. I wouldn't wait, unless you need a ride home.

You have only one 4+3 which is more aggressive than the 3+4’s. Others are less.

I cannot speak to medical reasons to postpone or not - that’s why you have doctors, However, if you DO postpone and have NOT done Physical Therapy Pelvic Floor, call your Doctor about this and do a 3-5 weeks of this prior to the RALP.

I did this, plus a few more weeks afterwards and I had ZERO continence issues, NONE!

From Amazon I bought WhataFit resistance bands ($30-$35) to repeat the exercises at home. Do this and recovery will be much easier, physically and mentally!

Best of luck to you.

Thanks for your input, very much appreciated!

Thanks for your input, very much appreciated.

Sure thing. By the way, I had NO pain afterwards, some discomfort. Nothing worth more than an aspirin.

I hope you have and have read Dr Walsh’s book on surviving prostate cancer. Read the highlights at each chapter start to see if you want to read the entire chapter. Dr Walsh developed the nerve-sparing surgery technique used in many prostate surgeries.

I hope your surgery goes as well as mine did!

Good Luck!

What did you end up deciding?

I was able to get the surgery scheduled for October, a nice compromise. Thanks for asking.

Wishing you the best of luck and healing wishes! (and btw, I meant to comment on your biopsy result chart - very clear and design-conscious way to present the findings.)

Personally, if I were delaying surgery, I would ask my surgeon if they could give me ADT for that 3 month period. ADT quickly attacks the food for the cancer and it might prevent some cancer growth during that 3 month delay. My surgery was delayed 6 months in a clinical trial and during that time I was given Lupron and Erleada. I was told the the lupron made the cancer softer and easier to remove and hopefully completely remove. Good Luck.

BTW, I did read Walsh’s book. Good read. It has a lot of information. I met with an oncologist the other day, he was extremely knowledgeable and laid out my options much more efficiently than my surgeon. In my situation he did not say RP surgery was the wrong choice, he laid out the pros and cons of both radiation with ADT and RP. Such a difficult decision.