After reviewing the different procedures I am inclining for the FLA to treat my problem with BPH. Do any men have experiences to share, as for the surgery itself and the recovery thereafter? Thanks to all!
There are several threads on this on this forum. Do you a search and you should find them. I had it done by Dr K 9 weeks ago with great results so far. Two others that I know of have had it done, as well as two more that should be having it done this week. There are probably more on here that I don't know about.
Do a search for ongoing threads on FLA for BPH. We have three members here who have discussed their experiences with the procedure.
Jim
As Motoman has already said, plenty of discussions on here on the subject of laser treatment for BPH, so trawl through them and assess the pro's and con's for yourself.
Laser treatment in all its forms is far, far better than the standard TURP which still uses a hot cauterising wire to remove prostate tissue which is pretty barbaric however, it does allow the pathology team to put the tissue under the microscope to search for prostate cancer which all the laser treatments with the exception of HoLEP do not allow, as all the tissue is vapourised.
I went for a HoLEP procedure and was discharged within 24 hours without a catheter. The down side was a non agressive cancer was discovered but hey that's no big deal.
Good luck.
Motoman, you had some difficulty for a week or 2 after surgery, correct?
Bear in mind FLA isn't usually covered by insurance
First week I had a Foley catheter in, so yes, that was difficult. The second week it was out, and I did self cathing 2-3 times a day to make sure I was empty. Not sure how it would have been without the ability to self cath. I would not recommend this procedure without having some on hand, and the knowledge of how to use them.
My insurance just rejected my claim. I thought they would, but tried anyway. I think they sent it to Dr K for more information.
I don't care, it has been worth every penny to me.
Motoman, did you start a thread of your own to give details of your experience?
Yeah,
it's on here somewhere. I don't think you can put links in. But it was active a week or so ago.
Thanks I'll look for it
I will try posting the link:
https://patient.info/forums/discuss/had-fla-for-bph-done-feb-13-568652
Thanks for the link motoman. I remember your thread now, especially since I posted in it a couple of times thanks for keeping us updated
emil
I just had FLA for BPH in Houston on April the 6th (19 days ago) by Dr K. The procedure was a breeze, with no pain or side affects. Because I was on blood pressure meds prior to and you have to stop takeing them about a week before, I came into the procedure with elevated blood pressure and my blood oxygen levels were just a little low, so Dr K did not put me under totally. I was basically awake for the whole procedure. Also, my prostate was very large, 176cc or ml. So I was in the MRI scanner for over 3 hours. It all seemed to go very quickly, considering the time involved. No pain during or after the procedure. Dr K and his assistant, Samantha are excellent. These people are unlike no others, they really care. I have talked to Dr K for sometimes 2 hours on the phone. I have been in touch with him every couple of days, either by phone, email or texting. You have a catherter in you for the 1st week, then if everything is OK, you can remove the cath. There will be some blood in your urine for awhile, Just where a Depends pad in your underwear till it disappears, I still have some so I continue to wear one, just so you don't wreck your underwear. There are other forums on this website where there are patients of FLA or ones that are considering having it done.
Right now I only know of 2 IR's that do this procedure. Dr Spir g in New Your / Florida and Dr Kara----ian in Houston. I was in touch with both and with Dr Kara----ian, I got to talk to his patients and the doctor and his assistant almost anytime I called. With Dr Speri---ng, I never talked to him, only his assistant, who was nice, but I never talked to any of his patients. He claims to have done over a 100 of the procedures. There is suppose to be one of his patients on this site, but no one that I know of has ever talked to a single patient of his. I have been in touch on this website with at least 4 of Dr K patients. That is all it took for me to make my mind up. I live in Michigan and had my preliminary 3T-MRI scan done at the University of Michigan Hospital in Ann Arbor. They were real nice and my insurance paid for it after Dr K wrote a script for me to have it done. They put the 1 hour scan on a DVD, then the next day had a doctor review the scan. They made up a report of their findings and they gave me a disc and a copy of the report as well as sending a copy of the same thing to Dr K in Houston.
If you want to know more, you can PM me so that the post will not get deleted.
Mike
Motoman
Mike here. We have talked before. Weren't you the one that took off on a motorcycle trip to Japan shortly after the procedure?
I just had FLA for BPH in Houston on April the 6th (19 days ago) by Dr K. The procedure was a breeze, with no pain or side affects. Because I was on blood pressure meds prior to and you have to stop takeing them about a week before, I came into the procedure with elevated blood pressure and my blood oxygen levels were just a little low, so Dr K did not put me under totally. I was basically awake for the whole procedure. Also, my prostate was very large, 176cc or ml. So I was in the MRI scanner for over 3 hours. It all seemed to go very quickly, considering the time involved. No pain during or after the procedure. Dr K and his assistant, Samantha are excellent. These people are unlike no others, they really care. I have talked to Dr K for sometimes 2 hours on the phone. I have been in touch with him every couple of days, either by phone, email or texting. You have a catherter in you for the 1st week, then if everything is OK, you can remove the cath. There will be some blood in your urine for awhile, Just where a Depends pad in your underwear till it disappears, I still have some so I continue to wear one, just so you don't wreck your underwear.
I had real problems when I tried to leave Houston. I had the procedure done on Thursday and was going to fly home to Michigan on Saturday morning per the doctors instructions. That weekend is when they had all the storms accross the whole south. My wife works for Delta and was with me, but we fly standby. Needless to say we could not get out of Houston. We had to take a flight to Salt Lake to get to Detroit, because all the flights to Detroit were overbooked. The only way we got out was the last flight to SLC they only had one flight attendant and needed a minimum of 3 for the flight to go. So my wife volunteered and wearing her street clothes and we cut an agreement that if she worked that I could go on the flight as well. Made it to SLC late at night and then had to start all over again the next morning trying to get to DTW. The real kicker was the cath bag that dr K used on me had a 3 line manifold stuck to my leg. One of the lines had a shutoff that fell out of the line when we were running in the terminal to catch our flight. All of a sudden my pant leg was totally soaked all the way down into my shoe, which got soaked. I did not know what I was going to do. Went in the restroom, opened my suitcase and found a Qtip. I rammed it up into the line, changed my pants etc. I put my soaked clothes into my suitcase. We checked in for our flight, checked the bag to DTW, but we could not make the flight. By the time we got home Monday afternoon and found my suitcase. You can imagine what it smelled like, UUGh! This was my first dealings with a catheter. I called john12080, and told him and he laughed his ass off.
I got all the procedure codes from Sam and just now submitting them to my insurance. We have out of Network coverage and with the discussion I had with them prior to the procedure, they thought that parts of the procedure they might cover, being that this is the same procedure Dr K uses for FLA / Pca. But there will be deductables for both meeting the insurance deductable and then the out of Network deductable. By the time they slice and dice the deal I might get a couple hundred back, but at least the dedutables will all be paid if I need something else done and the rest I will claim on my taxes for 2017.
So how you really doing? 19 days and I still have blood everytime I pee. I can sleep all night now, what a blessing that is along with a meletonin and the Flomax script I got. I am not peeing in dribbles like before the procedure. I have a light to medium stream, but the blood you have to be carefull you don't get it on your clothes.
That is quite the story on the catheter. I honestly was worried about that exact problem. And I carried the right stuff with me to block the line if I needed to, as well as had a valve to use in place of the bag.
I did go to Japan, but it was 6 weeks after the procedure. Everything is fine with me, my prostate was a little sore sitting on a motorcycle seat all day for two weeks. But that has improved as well.
I got off the BPH med I was taking at about 4 weeks. It was Terazosin instead of Flomax. I can pee on command now, that hasn't been the case for probably 10 years.
My insurance was rejected last week. Dr. K had given me all the codes as well.
Sounds like you are well on your way to recovery, it should only get better for another 4-6 weeks. Keep updating us.
Jim
Mike here. You are the perfect one to get this info to be spreed on to others. "Clinical Trials Awareness Week" starts May 3rd 11am to 12pm, Experts discuss Industry Trends & Challenges with a free online seminar to make people aware of some of the new medical procedures that are currently going through testing for them to follow the progress, requirements and controls for these tests. It also gives indicators the timing for possible approval and an idea of many of the New Procedures that are being worked on.
Dr K will have his trial listed in here as well. When he gets the official link as to how it will be labeled he said he would send it to me to post.
Mike
"Clinical Trials Awareness Week" starts May 3rd 11am to 12pm, Experts discuss Industry Trends & Challenges:
Hi Mike,
Thanks for the link. At what stage is Dr. K's trial in? Any completed procedures?
I'm happy to hear that your FLA went so well. Please keep us updated on your post FLA progress. Also, you might try and slow down running through airports until they develop a "runner's model" Foley
Jim
Mike, did you get a private message from me? FLA with DR K scheduled for Friday at 6am.
Trustme, Please do an after action report when you're done.