Trauma as the cause of Peyronie's disease: penile fracture as a model of trauma

Abstract

Purpose: This study was performed to determine whether patients with penile fracture or a long history of forcefully bending the erect penis (taqaandan), as models of acute and chronic penile trauma, had an increased rate of Peyronie's disease (PD).

Materials and methods: The study included 193 surgical cases of penile fracture (average followup 85 months), 150 cases of long history of taqaandan, and 50 cases of PD. All 3 groups of patients were interviewed and physically examined.

Results: Signs of PD were found in only 1 case of long-term taqaandan and in no case of penile fracture. None of the 50 cases of PD had a history of penile fracture.

Conclusions: Severe, acute trauma of penile fracture and moderate, chronic buckling injury of taqaandan are not associated with later development of PD. These findings question whether the hypothesis that trauma, trauma-induced smoldering inflammatory cascade and aberrant wound healing are the main causes of PD. Alternative, plausible, evidence based explanations should be sought for the etiology of PD. Any theory on the etiology of PD should provide an explanation for total lack of occurrence of PD following the trauma of penile fracture.