A man who fell off his moped apparently suffered a much more unusual injury than you’d expect from such an accident.
Rather than cuts, bruises or even broken bones, the 35-year-old man had to go to the emergency room nine days after the accident left him suffering from a painful erection.
According to doctors, the man had initially bruised his perineum – the area between the genitals and anus, also known as the ‘taint’ or ‘gooch’ – but before long had developed an erection which lasted much, much longer than expected.
The unusual occurrence was published in the medical journal Case Reports in Urology, where doctors from the University Hospital in Southampton, England, described the reasons for the nine-day boner.
Though the 35-year-old said the swollen member itself wasn’t painful, he did experience ‘mild discomfort on walking.’ Doctors classified his condition as a Grade IV erection – the highest rating on the Erection Hardness Score – caused by a condition known as high-flow priapism.
Low-flow priapism is the reason for around 95 per cent of erections which last too long. Low-flow priapism is caused by blocked blood vessels connected to the penis, resulting in blood not being able to flow away from the penis as it should.
High-flow priapism, however, involves blood rushing to the genital area without stopping, and usually occurs when the surrounding blood vessels are injured or ruptured due to physical trauma.
In the 35-year-old’s case, his injury from the moped accident caused a pooling of blood in the perineum area and two fistulas on either side of his genitals. Fistulas are abnormal connections between two spaces in the body which, in this instance, redirected blood to the vessels controlling the man’s engorged tallywhacker.
Low-flow priapism is often more of a medical emergency than high-flow, as the blockage can kill off tissue and leave permanent damage to the penis if left unresolved.
While high-flow priapism is less dangerous, usually treated with non-invasive remedies like ice-packs and compression, in this case doctors opted for a procedure which involved using a catheter to block arteries feeding the erection. The doctors then created their own blood clots near the fistulas to divert blood away from the penis, using a gel-like foam which breaks down after a few weeks, as well as a microcoil to block other arteries.
Soon after the procedure, the man’s condition improved. It took some time for him to recover full use of his meat and two veg, but when doctors checked on him a year later, he reported having completely normal function once again.
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Charlie Cocksedge is a journalist and sub-editor at UNILAD. He graduated from the University of Manchester with an MA in Creative Writing, where he learnt how to write in the third person, before getting his NCTJ. His work has also appeared in such places as The Guardian, PN Review and the bin.