What Is LUTS and Does It Cause ED?

Highlights  

• Lower urinary tract symptoms cover urine storage and voiding problems.
• If you notice something out-of-place about how you urinate, you may have LUTS.
• Benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH) causes LUTS, and LUTS can cause erectile dysfunction.
• Doctors use PDE5 inhibitors like Cialis to treat LUTS and ED. 

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Lower urinary tract symptoms cover a wide range of conditions, some of which may cause erectile dysfunction. LUTS symptoms manifest when you pass urine and may affect every second man over 18. Doctors haven’t worked out a universal answer to the question, “What is LUTS?,” so it is impossible to tell how widespread LUTS-related conditions are.   

What is LUTS, and How Do You Know If You Have It?

You may have LUTS if you notice anything out of the ordinary with how you urinate. If you urinate too much, too little, or have difficulties emptying your bladder, you may have LUTS. Talk to your doctor about your symptoms. Only doctors can hand down a definitive diagnosis and prescribe a treatment for LUTS. 

How can you tell if you should ask your doctor about LUTS? 

LUTS Symptoms

The International Continence Society had grouped LUTS symptoms into two categories: storage symptoms and voiding symptoms. 

Storage Symptoms

Storage symptoms occur when your bladder can’t handle its urine load like it used to. Like other LUTS symptoms, storage symptoms are more frequent in older people. The older you get, the more likely you are to develop LUTS. 

Storage symptoms include: 

• The need to urinate often (frequency). You may find yourself having to go to the toilet often during the day or the night (nocturia). Nocturia disrupts sleep and can lead to other problems.
• Urinating more. If you pass larger urine volumes than normal during the day or night, you may have polyuria.
• Bladder-filling problems. You may feel like you have a full bladder most of the time or never have a full bladder. You may also get sudden urges to urinate without being able to control them, known as urgency.
• Incontinence symptoms. People suffering from incontinence find it impossible to hold their urine. They leak urine involuntarily, during sleep, during strenuous physical activity, or for many other reasons. Urinary incontinence can also occur due to toileting difficulties, overloaded bladder, neurologic problems, sexual activity, and disabilities. 

Nocturia is a common condition affecting one in two men. Storage symptoms are more common in men than voiding symptoms. 

Voiding Symptoms

As men age, they tend to experience more and more LUTS-related symptoms. Many of these symptoms manifest during urination. 

Voiding symptoms men with LUTS may experience include:

• Delayed urination. You may feel like you are ready to urinate, yet the jet takes its time to appear.
• Paruresis. You can’t urinate when others are around, though you have no problems urinating alone.
• Slow stream. It takes you a long time to empty your bladder.
• Interrupted urination. Your urinal jet starts then stops. And it starts again.
• Bloody urine. You notice blood in your urine.
• Painful urination. You find it painful to urinate.
• Terminal dribbling. Toward the end of urination, your stream slows to a dribble.
• Position-dependent urination. You can only urinate in a certain body position (e.g. sitting down).
• Urinary retention. When your bladder is full, you find it impossible to urinate.
• Partial voiding. You find it impossible to empty your bladder completely.
• Post-urination incontinence. After completing urination, you keep leaking urine for a while.
• Post-urination urgency. You feel like you must go again immediately after you complete urination. 

These symptoms can indicate LUTS or scores of other — potentially severe — health conditions. Talk to your doctor if you notice any of these symptoms or anything out of the ordinary when you urinate. 

What Causes LUTS?

Some LUTS symptoms seem to come with age. Older men tend to have weaker urinary streams than young men. 

Rsearchers have also established links between LUTS and other health conditions. They have noticed that abdominal obesity and high blood sugar or cholesterol levels tend to accompany the common storage symptoms. Obstructive sleep apnea is also a possible cause of LUTS. 

The conditions that may cause voiding symptoms are more diverse. They can include:

• Benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH)
• Erectile dysfunction (ED)
• Thyroid problems
• Weak urinary stream
• Obstructive sleep apnea 

Infections of the urinary tract may also cause LUTS. Blockages in the bladder, pelvic floor muscle dysfunction, cancer, and kidney stones can also trigger LUTS. 

LUTS and ED

LUTS and erectile dysfunction often go hand-in-hand. Therefore, LUTS sufferers may assume that the two are connected. But does LUTS cause ED?

Age is a risk factor for both conditions. Researchers have long known, however, that LUTS is a risk factor for erectile dysfunction. If you have LUTS and neglect your symptoms because they don’t bother you, they may eventually cause ED. 

Bottom line: An enlarged prostate, the processes that characterize LUTS, and certain LUTS treatments can lead to ED.

LUTS Diagnosis and Treatment

To diagnose LUTS, your doctor will ask you to provide information about your symptoms. To confirm the diagnosis, doctors may also order a urinanalysis to ensure that the cause of your symptoms isn’t a urinary tract infection (UTI). Prostate tests will tell your doctor whether you have BPH, a common cause of LUTS. 

Your doctor’s suggested treatment plan will be based on the severity of your symptoms and the peculiarities of your circumstances.

Some medicines can cause LUTS. If you discontinue using them, your symptoms may disappear without additional treatment. If they don’t, your doctor will prescribe another treatment. 

Your treatment options are: 

• Medication. PDE5 inhibitors like tadalafil cure LUTS in about half of the patients who undergo treatment. New drug combinations, like a finasteride/tadalafil oral medication, can treat the underlying causes of LUTS, like BPH.
• Pelvic floor muscle training. Getting the pelvic floor muscles into better shape may help some LUTS patients who do not respond to medication.
• Surgery. Surgery and minimally invasive surgical therapies can help LUTS patients who do not respond to other treatment methods.
• Herbal compounds. Saw palmetto may offer an alternative treatment path for LUTS. Currently, the American Urological Association does not recommend herbal and unconventional treatments as viable alternatives to FDA-approved medication, but a recent study has found that saw palmetto may be a reasonable treatment option. 

The drugs doctors use as the main weapons against LUTS improve erectile function. PDE5 inhibitors like sildenafil, vardenafil, and tadalafil constitute the first line of defense against LUTS. Coincidentally, they are also the active compounds in Viagra and Cialis. 

Cialis May Be Part of the Solution

Tadalafil is the active compound in Cialis. Tadalafil 5 mg per day can significantly improve LUTS. When combined with finasteride, tadalafil has an even more promising impact on the condition. 

Could Cialis be the solution for LUTS?

Entadfi, a finasteride/tadalafil combination, is an FDA-approved drug for the treatment of LUTS. 

eDrugstore Can Help

If your goal is to defeat erectile dysfunction through the treatment of LUTS, eDrugstore can help. We carry Cialis as well as Propecia (finasteride). 

Our U.S.- licensed doctors can provide you with the prescriptions you need. Place your order today, and we will deliver your medication quickly and discreetly for free.