Treatment for penile cancer
Your surgeon uses a powerful beam of light that acts like a knife. It cuts away the cancer cells but doesn't go too deep into the tissue. You have a local or general anaesthetic. If you have a general anaesthetic you are asleep for the whole operation.
Read more about laser treatment
Chemotherapy cream only kills the cancer cells in the area of skin treated. Doctors use it for PeIN, or small early stage cancer on the foreskin or end of the penis. It is called topical chemotherapy.
You usually have your foreskin removed (circumcision) before you have topical creams.
The chemotherapy drug in the cream is fluorouracil (5FU). Or it could be a cream called imiquimod. Imiquimod uses the immune system to fight cancer.
You put the cream on the cancerous area, every day for several weeks. The cream only kills cancer cells in the top layers of the skin. It doesn't treat deeper cancers.
Your skin might become sore, red and inflamed when using chemotherapy cream. Tell your doctor or nurse if this happens. They can give you other creams and painkillers to help. These side effects should wear off within a couple of weeks after stopping treatment.
You don't lose your hair with chemotherapy creams.
Last reviewed: 28 Feb 2024
Next review due: 28 Feb 2027
Treatments for penile cancer include surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy. The treatment you have depends on the stage and type of your penile cancer.
The stage, type and grade of your cancer helps your doctor decide which treatment you need.
At first, you usually have follow up appointments every few months to check how you are.
Coping with penile cancer can be difficult. There are things you can do, people who can help and ways to cope with your diagnosis.
Penile cancer is cancer of the penis. It can develop anywhere on the penis but is most common under the foreskin in men who haven’t been circumcised or on the head of the penis (the glans).
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