Comparison of RigiScan and penile color duplex ultrasound in evaluation of erectile dysfunction.

BACKGROUND: Whether RigiScan could distinguish psychogenic from organic erectile dysfunction (ED) is still a matter of controversy. So this study was aimed to investigate the function of RigiScan in the diagnosis of ED, and compare it with that of pharmacopenile color doppler ultrasonography (PCDU).

METHODS: This is a retrospective cohort study. All patients should be performed IIEF-5 questionnaire, blood test, RigiScan, PCDU, Neurophysiological tests. Golden standard: one patient was diagnosed as organic ED when any of the following tests was abnormal, including sex hormone, PCDU and neurological tests. Student t test, Kappa test and ROC analyses was used to analyze the difference between RigiScan and PCDU. Statistical analyses were performed using SPSS 25.0 and EmpowerStats software.

RESULTS: According to the standard: 70 patients (35.4%) were detected abnormal responses to intracavernous injection in PCDU and normal responses in 128 cases (64.6%). RigiScan had a significant but weak positive correlation with PCDU test (kappa value =0.361, P<0.01). In the ROC analyses, RigiScan was better in sensitivity (0.8603 vs. 0.5147). In the patients revealed organic lesions by RigiScan, 61 of 119 (51.3%) patients were detected abnormal responses by PCDU.

CONCLUSIONS: RigiScan was the preferential choice in distinguishing psychogenic ED from organic ED. PCDU could not replace RigiScan by now. But PCDU was the preferential choice in ED with vascular lesions.