Prostatitis > Treatment
If a bacterial infection is the cause of your symptoms, you will be prescribed a course of appropriate antibiotics. You may need to take these for a relatively long period, often 4-6 weeks, and it is very important that you complete the course (the diagram below explains why this is so). You may also be prescribed an anti-inflammatory drug, such as Voltarol (diclofenac), to reduce the inflammation in the prostate. Remember that these drugs can cause indigestion and bleeding from the stomach, so you should always take them with a meal.
| A course of antibiotics should always be taken as directed and completed. If not, the stronger 'resistant' bacteria are not killed by the antibiotics and multiply, so the infection becomes harder to clear. |
If bacteria are not demonstrably present, you may be given an anti-inflammatory drug in isolation. You may also find that prostatic massage performed by your doctor helps (see the diagram below). Antibiotics can also be helpful in these circumstances, perhaps because the cultures do not tell the whole story, as the bacteria may be lurking within prostate stones or elsewhere deep within the gland.
Prostatitis, though troublesome, is not a life-threatening condition and is not proven to be a precursor to either BPH or prostate cancer. You may find that, over the years, the prostatitis returns from time to time (particularly if the condition has a non-bacterial cause), but your doctor should be able to help alleviate the symptoms quite effectively, so do not suffer in silence. The condition can be frustrating for patient and doctor alike; however, there is some evidence that lifestyle improvements, particularly dietary modification and fitness enhancement, can increase natural immunity and reduce the risk of relapse.