Debbie says:

So I’m running errands Thursday night with newsradio on in the car, and the announcer says, “Men with advanced prostate cancer who are treated with a combination of hormones and radiation are encountering serious symptoms, according to a new study.”

Well, I think, “Advanced cancer treatment has serious symptoms; I wonder what could warrant a special report on the news.” I’ve known some men with prostate cancer, so I was curious.

Given the work I do, I should have known. The serious symptoms are reduction in penile length. The radio didn’t say, but the link does, that the length measured is a “stretched penis,” presumably stretched by the patient’s (or the doctor’s?) hand. The radio also didn’t say that the study consisted of 47 subjects. (It also lasted five years, which implies that the patients lived that long.)So it’s a two-fer: junk science and pressure on men (even potentially dying men) to worry about the length of their schlongs.

Has anyone told the doctors that if you’re dead your penis length really doesn’t matter at all?

prostate cancer, men, men’s health, body image, penis, junk science, penile length, Body Impolitic