FEATURE PATIENT
EASING THE URGE Urologist Explains Treatments For Enlarged Prostate by PAUL CATALA
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ike many men, John Sutphin first began to notice he was having a bit of difficulty urinating when he was in his 40s, but he didn’t consider it serious enough for medical treatment. The 72-year-old retired Kissimmee police chief says he had a urinary catheter put in during triple bypass in January 2021 and experienced difficulty urinating after it was taken out. A urinary catheter again was inserted following another three-week hospital stay, and this time he had it for four months. That’s when Sutphin, who spent 30 years in law enforcement, says he contacted BayCare Medical Group’s Dr. Kenneth Essig, a Winter Haven urology specialist. “I got out of the hospital with the catheter. I went through tests, bladder tests, and a urodynamic test in March 2021 – they all showed my prostate wasn’t working,” he says. “I went a few weeks later for a cystoscopy, and that’s when I realized I was going to have (prostate) surgery.”
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It wasn’t long after that the Lake Wales resident joined the approximately 50 percent of men in their 50s and 75 percent of men in their 70s who have benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), or enlarged prostate. “After the prostate laser surgery, about four or five days later, they took the catheter out and I was able to pee right then and I have not had a problem since. It’s like nothing ever happened to me,” he says. And that’s the result Essig of BayCare Medical Group strives to attain with all his patients. Essig, 61, who began practicing in Winter Haven in 1997, began working in urology because of the variety of patients he treats and the ability to “fix things definitively” with solutions rather than just managing medical problems. He says preventing prostate problems, particularly regarding BPH, is almost impossible and “it’s a natural function of aging. Prevention is not really something the medical community has a handle on yet.” Still, Essig adds there is a selection of ways to minimize the impact and the long- and shortcentralfloridahealthnews.com
