In this chapter, we will review how men’s health has evolved into a distinct subspecialty of medicine and changed over the past two decades. There exists a large disparity between men and women when it comes to health. However, as the drivers for men seeking health care are changing, the urologist is in a unique position to help quarterback men’s health initiatives. Men’s health advocacy and the creation of men’s health centers are on the rise. Areas of advancement in the field include prostate cancer diagnosis and treatment, erectile dysfunction therapies, surgical treatment for chronic testicular pain, and new approaches to male factor infertility. The burgeoning field of men’s health has seen many advancements in the past two decades and will continue to make significant gains in the years to come.

The internet constantly evolves and facilitates the development of new avenues for users to interact and communicate internationally. Social media and search engines represent the forefront of internet technologies that enable users to produce content, develop digital participatory networks, and share information across various topics. These internet tools are reshaping the continuum of care by enabling patients to acquire medical information, consult peers and healthcare practitioners, and even make treatment decisions without leaving their connected device. The consequences of circumventing traditional pathways to care are amplified in men’s health due to the fact that men frequently do not engage with the healthcare system and that erectile dysfunction and male infertility are stigmatized. The focus of this chapter is to evaluate the emerging online landscape for common men’s health conditions including male infertility, erectile dysfunction, hypogonadism, and Peyronie’s disease.

Long term male method of contraception, vasectomy, is described, along with immediate and long term complications and success rates

Female and male sterilization is an important and widely used method of contraception. While a safe and effective procedure, given its permanent nature care has to be taken when counselling men and women for this procedure to reduce the incidence of regret and reversal. Detailed discussion with both sexes regarding the risks of sterilization procedures and of alternative methods of contraception, such as long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs), is vital to allow fully informed consent. Laparoscopic sterilization is a popular method of female sterilization and is associated with low complication rates. Minimally invasive vasectomy (MIV), performed under local anaesthetic in the outpatient setting, is becoming the gold standard technique for male sterilization and results in fewer operative complications and less postoperative pain than more traditional methods. Hopefully further research into hysteroscopic sterilization techniques will allow this to become a more accessible and safer method of permanent contraception for women.

Hormones were hailed in the early twentieth century as one of the most promising explanations for physiological function. This chapter shows how hormone treatments – not just those carried out by medical practitioners – influenced public perceptions of youth and ageing. Laboratory and clinical research influenced the marketing of commercial rejuvenation therapies, and commercial entities produced an enticing range of products containing hormones. The widely publicised research of gland-manipulating surgeons – particularly Eugen Steinach and Serge Voronoff – who gained notoriety by performing rejuvenating operations designed to restore bodily hormonal balance, attracted considerable press interest. The press carried numerous reports of procedures carried out on prominent society figures, yet for many these expensive and highly specialised treatments were out of reach. I argue the main contribution by the work of Voronoff and Steinach to British public life was to sustain a significant market of new hormone-based products, from dietary supplements and skin creams which claimed to restore natural bodily balance to medical hormone preparations designed to address fertility problems.