How long has your inflatable implant lasted so far?

[Discovernew]

I am curious wether the statistics of the manufacturers are real based on user experiences.

[irishguy]

My implant lasted 12 years, and I'm waiting on a revision now

[Discovernew]

My implant lasted 12 years, and I'm waiting on a revision now

Actually 12 years seems like a great outcome. I will be very glad if my implant lasts that much!
What part of the implant failed? Do you know?

[Kodixx]

Discovernew,

My guess would be yes and no. Yes - their lawyers make sure there's real data, and a calculation that can be explained, to back up their published claims in case of a lawsuit. Some people would claim that they just make numbers up - not likely.

The No part of it is that they can cherry-pick the data, or make assumptions in the calculations, that others might not agree with - or feel represents the "reality" of IPP ownership.

- Chuck

I am curious whether the statistics of the manufacturers are real based on user experiences.

[irishguy]

Don't know what part yet but the otr pump has some issue with leaks at about the 10/ 12 year mark!!!! Look up doctor eid he explains about the pumps and the general length that the implants last

Also most people on this are people that are getting an implant or have not had a good experience so I doubt you'll get an accurate answer either way..
And also if my implanter tells me ill have to get a revision every 5 years, I'd still get it..

[LetoMan]

The No part of it is that they can cherry-pick the data, or make assumptions in the calculations, that others might not agree with

It’s funny, I can’t find any manufacturer claims online as to how long they last. Just seems to be a lot of doctor websites claiming either 12-15 years, 15-20 years, or 20 years.

To the extent the manufacturers do publish data, there are many reasons to expect that data is accurate.

The first is that for FDA approval or publication of a study, there is peer review where researchers without an interest in the outcome review the data and methodology. These studies don’t happen in a vacuum.

The second is that “informed consent” is a standard that is very important in the medical malpractice environment. If a manufacturer was claiming that they lasted 20 years but it turned out they were lying and it’s actually 12, then everyone who relied on that claim that it was 20 has a case against the manufacturer. People assume medical device manufacturers have an economic incentive to fudge those numbers. The opposite is actually true: they have strong economic incentives to get the numbers right.

All that said, I suspect there is a lot of confusion as to what is meant by “on average”. That likely means “median”… how long does it last for the average guy? But some of you may be assuming they mean “mean” average. But that’s not as useful of a number. If they say the average is 20, that would mean for every device that failed within a year, there had to be a corresponding device that lasted 40. We all know that is not true. But it also doesn’t tell us much.

Without any evidence, my suspicion is that the distribution is a bell curve with a chunkier initial tail. There is probably a sizable number of failures within the first few years. How many? I don’t know. But I suspect most guys do in fact get that 15-20 year period.

You know what is a wildly unscientific way of figuring it out? Running a poll on FrankTalk. There is a massive amount of bias. Most guys without problems likely have never even heard of this site.

[LastHope]

FDA's MAUDE* database is a good tool to lookup explanted devices and the reason for explantation by time period if anyone is interested in digging.

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/ ... search.cfm

For Titan, enter
Brand Name = TITAN, Manufacturer Name = Coloplast

and for AMS, enter
Brand Name = AMS, Manufacturer Name = Boston

Select a date range within the last 10 years and hit Search.

Any device removal anyone underwent for a revision, is logged here.

What this won't tell us:
1) Failed devices that were not explanted
2) Details about functioning devices

These dates will give you a clue on how long a specific device lasted:

Initial Date FDA Received: 02/28/2025
Date Device Manufactured: 02/16/2023

For the above example, we know for sure the device didn't last more then two years.

*MAUDE - Manufacturer and User Facility Device Experience

[Kodixx]

LetoMan,

The only one I've found is this from AMS. When I talked to the AMS patient rep about those figures, they didn't seem to know how the data was collected, or what was specifically included or excluded from "mechanical survival". We would hope that means it works like brand new ? And how were the 37,000 patients selected ? Just curious

No doubt their lawyers ensure the claims are defensible - but the info could be so much more useful.

What would be way more useful is knowing things like, does "easy going" or "hard pounding" (cylinders) make a survival difference ? Do other physical activities like cycling (tubing) make a survival difference ? How about survival rate by implanter and type of problem (technique & sizing) ?

- Chuck

How long does an implant last?
It’s impossible to predict how long an implant will function in a particular person. Implants subject to wear and mechanical failure over time. A recent study of more than 37,000 patients showed that the 7-year mechanical survival of the Boston Scientific AMS 700™ Penile Implant is greater than 94%.4 To prolong the life of your implant, follow the advice of your urologist. - Boston Scientific website

It’s funny, I can’t find any manufacturer claims online as to how long they last. Just seems to be a lot of doctor websites claiming either 12-15 years, 15-20 years, or 20 years.

[newbie443]

I am curious wether the statistics of the manufacturers are real based on user experiences.

There is one very large study of men who were implanted. Not just a very small few that are on this site. 14969 men implanted from1995 to 2014. This is going to be as close as you can get. While newer devices implanted should last longer the older device would not last as long. The study is to show the impact of case volume on implant surgery. As part of that it covers how long devices last in relationship to case volume (low or high volume doctor). If you scroll down to page 227 (document starts on page 223) you will find the percentage of implanted devices that last up to 10 years depending on the surgeons' case volume. https://www.garber-online.com/pdf/Highe ... ctions.pdf

Small little polls on this site where most men are looking for help is totally worthless. The results of a non-scientific study will do nothing but spread bad information. All these threads seem to be work by men who seem to want to disprove good information published not only by manufactures and doctors, but scientific studies like the one above.

if you really want good information read the study I linked above. This and the others like it on this site are bad information to base a choice on.

[LastHope]

The study is to show the impact of case volume on implant surgery. As part of that it covers how long devices last in relationship to case volume (low or high volume doctor).

Thanks for sharing this! Based on the paper, a surgeon’s case volume doesn’t seem to correlate with mechanical failures but only shows a correlation with infectious complications. Thoughts?

Page 227:
"We did not observe a relationship between surgeon experience and rates of reoperation for noninfectious complications after IPP surgery. Dubocq et al performed a single center retrospective review of 366 IPP cases, another study that examined the impact of surgeon experience on IPP mechanical failure rates, and similarly found no difference between high and low volume implanters. The absence of an association between surgeon experience and noninfectious IPP failure is not surprising.Surgeon experience has no impact on the physical mechanical properties of prostheses and, therefore, would not be expected to have an impact on the likelihood of mechanical failure. In addition, we speculate that although lower volume implanters might be more prone to errors in pump placement or device sizing, lower volume implanters might also be less likely to perform a repeat operation in a patient with suboptimal but noncatastrophic IPP outcomes such as glans hypermobility or pump migration."