Men with prostate trouble will be seen on either the NHS or in the private sector after a referral has been made by your general practitioner. Few men get all the symptoms all the time, so a questionnaire is widely used that enables you to rate each of the 7 symptoms commonly experienced on a score of 0 to 5.



The answers you give will determine how severe your symptoms are, and will help determine your future treatment. If your general practitioner has referred you, you will be asked to complete the questionnaire, and when you arrive at the clinic, you will also be asked to pass urine into a special device known as a flow meter, which will give a printout of the speed with which you pass your urine, a very useful measurement to decide how bad your problem is. Few men can assess their flow against other men in the same boat, so this measurement saves them the need to do so. It is therefore necessary for you to be able to pass a normal sort of volume for the test, so come with a comfortably full bladder, or be ready to drink a few glasses of water when you arrive. Once you have passed your urine for the test (which is done behind a locked door in a normal toilet), you will be invited in for examination of your tummy, including an ultrasound of the bladder to assess how well your bladder has emptied, and a rectal examination to assess the prostate. If a PSA test has already been done, and is abnormal, then it may well be possible to proceed directly to a prostate biopsy if this is indicated, but this will not be done without your agreement.

From the information gained by these simple and painless tests, it should be possible to tell how severe your problem is, and further action can then be taken if necessary.