For the 150,000 American men diagnosed each year with prostate cancer, the treatment -- and its common side effect, impotence -- is sometimes as bad as the disease. Now Stanford urologists are evaluating a new tool that can help pinpoint the microscopic nerves around the prostate that control sexual function. The device allows surgeons to remove the cancer without damaging critical nerves.
Approved a year ago by the Food and Drug Administration, the instrument works by electrically stimulating the nerves around the prostate and measuring the erection response. This helps produce a "map" of the critical nerves, which are invisible to the naked eye. Doctors can then navigate around them during surgery.
By simplifying a challenging surgical procedure, the tool ultimately could make nerve-sparing surgeries more widely available to prostate cancer patients, says James Brooks, MD, an assistant professor of urology. The new device, called the CaverMap Surgical Aid, is being evaluated at 21 medical centers nationwide.
