Dr Phil: Scrotal lumps (video)

Now, the thing about your plums is that they come in a handy carrying sack called the scrotum, and in a healthy man your scrotum should look about 30 years older than you are. If you look roughly the same age as your scrotum, get some sleep: it’s a handy little test (little top tip there).

 

Now, the scrotal lumps that really matter are the ones that are actually within the plums themselves. If you examine your scrotum, probably best to do it after a hot shower when things are nice and relaxed and hanging down a bit, put them in the palm of your hand and you‘ll find that your plums should roughly weigh the same. In a lot of people one plum is slightly bigger than the other one but they should roughly weigh the same. In most men the left plum hangs down slightly lower than the right one. You sort of weigh them in the palm of your hand and then one at a time, just gently between thumb and fingers, just gently rotate them back: obviously not all the way round as they’ll come off. Most men aren’t very good at multiskilling so I say generally do one plum at a time. What you’re looking for is a lump within the plum itself, so not in the scrotum around the testicle but actually within the body of the testicle. And it will start often like a little grain of sand and you’ll think ‘oooh, little bit tender, that’s not quite right, like a grain of sand’, then it gets to the size of a pea and you think ‘oooh, that’s not quite right’. You should have gone to the doctor by then. What generally happens with blokes is they go ‘aaah, I’ve got a lump in my testicle, it’s embarrassing, it’s in my testicle, it’s a lump, that’s embarrassing’, and they let it get bigger. Then it get so big they think ‘the doctor’s going to think I’m a complete arse for having left it so long’ – I once saw a bloke whose testicle got to size of grapefruit because he was so embarrassed about having a lump. The lump will start as a grain of sand and if you get it at that early stage, it’s an easy job sorting it out: 96% of testicular cancer is cured these days. They bigger it gets, the more likely it is that they might have to remove a bit of your testicle, sometimes the whole testicle, but even then the chance of a cure is pretty good. So certainly grain of sand, great, if it’s the size of a pea, definitely you should be down the doctors.

 

Outside the testicle you have some tubes, some sperm collecting tubes, the epididymis, which feel a bit like al dente spaghetti. Sometimes it can get a bit like a bag of worms, you can get varicose veins around there and sometimes you get a little cyst there. If it’s very tender around the testicle you can get epididymitis, sometimes happens with a sexually transmitted infection. And then above, behind the epididymis and up, you’ve got the sperm collecting tube, that takes the sperm out. When you get to my age, 47, testicular cancer gets rarer, you get generally hernias in the testicle and your guts can come down into your scrotum. There’s a famous picture in a surgical textbook of a bloke whose entire gut came down through a hole, like a hole in a sock, into his inguinal canal, and he had his entire guts in his testicle. He had to push his entire scrotum around in a wheelbarrow: it’s a great photo, probably on the internet.

 

The bottom line is look after your plums, examine them once a month or so after a warm shower, any lumps, any little grain of sand, any anything within the testicle itself, get it sorted.

 

For more amusing top tips on your sexual health I would recommend Sex, Sleep or Scrabble, available at all major outlets, and of course a visit to the embarrassingproblems.com website, which has a whole wealth of information about embarrassing problems. See you soon.

 

Written by: Dr Phil Hammond
Edited by: Dr Phil Hammond
Last updated: Tuesday, January 11th 2011

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Comments on this article

Posted by Optional on 09/07/2011 at 02:52

i am realy worried about my penis and testicles becouse my penis has small white lumps a little bit less then a millimetre all around the bottom of my penis and around my testicle sack! also my penis is bent and is probably 20% bent to the left :S not only that i feel something around my left testicle witch im not sure what it could be + my left testicle is a bit heavy and bigger the the right please help i am really worried and dont no what to do as i am only 13 ??? !!!!

Posted by Optional on 28/05/2011 at 04:14

this is a purplish sack within the veiny area about the right testicle, which seems to be made up of the veins in a knot. it is extremely tender, even to the touch.

Posted by William on 26/02/2011 at 11:26

I have a lot of sweating and sticky fluid around my scrotum what is very uncomfortable at night times by itching. Been to the Dr and had scan, was told that I have two cysts on my tubes, he gave me Daktacort, OK stops the itch for a while but dont seen to help with restless nights. Regards William.

Posted by Optional on 12/12/2010 at 11:06

Hey, thanks for the information. Found a grain of sand sized lump on my left testical, and was wondering if that was big enough to bother the doctor with. Might be nothing, but from what you've said I've decided to get myself checked out early rather than to wait and see. thanks

Posted by bruno on 15/10/2010 at 10:12

i just wanted to know if hmg could help me grow bigger testicles i have not been ever on steroids but i have small adult testicles just would like to have them fuller i have 23million sperm

Posted by anwar ashraf on 04/08/2010 at 08:47

hello sir, Two year before my right testis torisioned and made it correct by a sugery. I want to know a detailed explanation of those surgeries and its side effects.

Posted by maah on 17/06/2010 at 10:57

i hate ihave one testicle i cant show women when i make sex

Posted by Wayne F on 15/06/2010 at 05:49

About 20 years ago I had surgery on my testis on one side the Dr. said I had vericocele and on the other hydrocele, I had a very painful and difficult recovery. 10-15 years later..I was in a couple of auto accidents and got groin herina surgery with mesh. After this surgery I developed cronic pain in testis. I have had it looked at by 6 Uroligists ( ultrasound was done many times )and 4 nuroligists ( MRI's and cat scans ) they all claim it is due to lower back pain/ nerve damage that radiates to my scrotum. I think they all come to this conclusion because they are piggybacking their opionins on prior examinations. I have to self inject numbing medication 20CC 2x daily opiod medications help by don't help by themselves. Problem is this... I have a slowly enlarging HARD lump in my sac and outside my testis it appears to be on the surface of the testis and does not float I think it changes from a pea size to a grape size and is very very very tender...because it is tender I insist it is related to the overall pain issue. Even though I know the post surgery issues I would have to deal with. I would like it removed and if need be the testis and sacs can go as well as long as I don't lose sexual function, I am not interested in children but i would like my life back and believe this would help. I do have back problems from S1 though to C2 but this pain is managed with medications for the most part. What would you suggest? What would you guess the real problem is? Also note after sexual arousal it hurts more for days afterward so I have to be wary of any arousal, this is near impossable I have tried sex and do get normal erection but the pain afterward is a 10/10 which confines me to bed with ice packs. I have tried to asperate the lump myself( talk about pain!!! ) it appears not to be purely fluid I didn't get anything with draining with a very fine needle. I tried larger needles and still nothing!