Difficulty in voiding after radiation treatment

You are having radiation done in 20 sessions. They used to do the same thing in 35 to 40 sessions giving smaller amounts of radiation every time. You need to discuss this with the radiation Oncologist. They may have to reduce the intensity of the radiation, a little bit in order for you to avoid this problem. That would require more sessions, but it could be beneficial to you.

Definitely talk to them about this problem, It is unusual.

Jeff

Your replies are so helpful to members who are concerned

I for one am appreciative of your thoughtful responses

They have been helpful for me personally

Mark

Thank you for your input. I definitely will be discussing this with the radiation oncologist.

@scbrett01
I had a specific built in mri radiation machine so the margins were less but the intensity more. I had 5 total sessions. After the third, my urination was constrained but Flomax took care of it overnight. For a little while afterward, I carried a plastic urination bottle in the car which did come in handy a few times. My urination before treatment has now returned.

What type of radiation machine did you have?

This is interesting. I have radiation coming up in about a month. One of the hopes of radiation is to shrink the prostate enough so I can pee on my own again. I have been self-catheterizing since March.

I will definitely be asking the radiation oncologist if this will be happening

I am very curious why your physician recommended radiation as the first step in treatment? Per my physician who was adamant about this, he said: "you never want to do radiation 'first' because it basically turns your prostate into a walnut sized chunk of concrete, making it impossible to perform a successful radical prostatectomy (RP) thereafter." He said, "you should always do the RP 'first', and if/when you need it, follow-up with radiation."
I know this for a fact as well: the father of the girl who cuts my hair is in a living hell for the rest of his life. He did radiation because he feared surgery. He screams and groans/moans from pain every time he "tries" to urinate. When she visits her parents home, she sits and watches her concerned mother cry as her father's screams are coming through the bathroom wall as he spends 20 minutes trying to urinate. He comes out of the bathroom looking haggard from his futile efforts. And of course, his urologist said that he is no longer a candidate for RP due to the complete course of radiation he went through. My recommendation: Before you get further down the line with radiation, you may want to re-visit the "radiation vs RP" topic (pros and cons of both) before it is potentially too late for the RP. Good luck...I wish you well.

It's not my first step in treatment. Doublet therapy is the first step. Since there are more metastasis than the Doc writing my PSMA PET scan report cared to count, I was never a candidate for surgery. IMRT (IGRT) is the 2nd step and I'm pretty confident that chemo will be step 3, but that hasn't been decided yet. Normally, Pluvicto would be step 4 but since I have this pesky TP53 mutation that doesn't play well with Pluvicto, I'm hoping that current trials will come up with something else before I get there. All that said, I'm still looking at the green side of the grass and today's a pretty good day. I'll take it! 👍

Actually, radiation is the first treatment for a large number of prostate cancer cases. They may put someone on ADT first, to try to shrink the prostate, so that the radiation is more effective. I know dozens of men who’ve had radiation first.

Most patients are offered radiation or surgery, and both result in similar long-term outcomes. There are some exceptions where surgery makes more sense to start with, but in a huge number of cases, radiation is sufficient to remove the cancer.

Doublet therapy is almost never the first step. It is only used in advanced cases where the cancer has already metastasized. The majority of people with prostate cancer have not reached that point yet, so double therapy is not used.

15 years ago when my prostate cancer was found, I had surgery because my father had radiation and still died from it. 3 1/2 years later, I had to have radiation because it came back. Only at that point was I put on ADT for six months, Two months before the actual radiation.

2 1/2 years later, it came back and I went on ADT (Lupron). 2 1/2 years later when I became castrate resistant, I finally went on doublet therapy (Zytiga)..

The vast majority of people only get double therapy after they have a reoccurrence.

Hi, just finished 20
Fractions at Mayo 3 weeks ago. Mine developed on 3 rd treatment day.
Flomax 0.4 mg daily. Since finishing treatments It has leveled out and has improved. I see light at the end of tunnel. Hang in there. Good Luck.