Getting a Rectal Exam

Does anyone have any recomendations on how to ensure that your dr checks your prostate?

Turn 50. Unless your family history indicates otherwise, that is when you get the greased finger. 😃

Now for you younger guys, your physical should include a testicle exam. Testicular cancer is more prevalent in males age 20 - 40.

Find a play doctor. You can have your prostate examined as often and as long as you want. More over, you won't have to risk having your real doc see through your deceitfulness and branding you a "difficult" patient. Depending on the Doc, hitting 50 is no longer a sure thing for a DRE. However, lying to the Doc and telling them you have a family history of early prostate cancer would probably do the trick.

This has never been a problem for me. The exam of the genitals and hernia exam is the part that I find humiliating/stimulating. Doctors all started doing rectal/prostate from the time I finished college. I would think to mention a family history of prostate and colon cancers would get it done by most doctors. Have you found that doctors did not do a rectal on you?

Rectal temps are still pretty common especially when you work with one of these foreign doctors. At our walk in clinic if someone is vomiting or has dry heaves you will get the red probe in your butt both young and old. You are almost guaranteed to get a shot in the butt too. That is just how he practices.

Rectal temps have almost fell out of use in most scenarios with the doctors i've been to.

Rectal exams it depends on what you are going in for. If you tell the doctor you might have something that warrants checked out via a DRE, they will examine your bottom. The question is do they probe the finger fully or they just go up to the first spincter muscle.

I would just tell your Doctor that you'd like to have it checked... they MIGHT ask why... you could just say something like "i've seen some blood in my stool sometimes". I'm sure that'll get you a thorough rectal exam. If not .. contact me and I'd be happy to schedule an appointment with me for one. 😄

The following are the symptoms of prostatitis:

Trouble passing urine or pain when passing urine

A burning or stinging feeling when passing urine

Strong, frequent urges to pass urine, even when there is only a small amount of urine to be passed

Chills and high fever

Low back pain or body aches

Pain low in the belly, groin, or behind the scrotum

Rectal pressure or pain

Urethral discharge with bowel movements

Genital and rectal throbbing

Sexual problems and loss of sex drive

Blocked urine

Painful ejaculation (sexual climax).

You don't have to complain of them all, but two or three together and you'll probably be bent over the table fairly quickly.

However, I wouldn't advise making an appointment just for these symptoms, unless of course, you are actually experiencing them, but if you're already scheduled for a check-up, then you won't be tying up a doctor and taking him/her away from folks who are really ill. If you just want the finger wave, find a playmate

Of course, as someone else has said, turning 50 will do it, as well as a family history of prostate problems will almost guarantee a DRE.

I thought that I was developing a hernia once because I had some discomfort in my lower abdomen and groin that lasted a couple of weeks. Finally and reluctantly went to my doctor. Told him my symptoms and told him that I was worried about a hernia.

Doctor listened patiently and then had me drop my jeans and underwear and checked me for a hernia with his fingers under my balls on both sides and me coughing. He didn't detect anything from that so he had me keep my pants down and bend over the exam table. I had rectal exams before so I knew what was coming. He snapped on a latex glove and lube it up and, of course, I got a prostate exam up my rear. He had pressed hard on my prostate but didn't culture any of the fluid. He just had me pull up my pants and go immediately to the lab to give a urine sample.

I guess that the lab checked the urine for bacteria that would indicate a prostate infection. I made the mistake of following the instructions for giving a regular urine sample that was on the wall of the lab's restroom so my sample didn't show any bacteria. The lab didn't know what the doctor was looking for and neither did I since he didn't say to do anything different from a regular urine sample. Since the sample came back okay, the doctor's nurse called to say it was clean but that the doctor was asking if I had mistakenly followed the urine sample instructions and I said that I had because no one told me not to. The nurse said, "okay, come back in to see the doctor if you keep having problems." Whatever was my problem cleared in a few days so I didn't go back in, but it was a reminder that my doctor needed to be clearer about what he wanted me to do.