Has anyone experiencing blood in their urine a few years after radiation therapy?
My doctor attributes it to Radiation Proctitis, which affects the blood vessels in the bladder neck.
If any of you are or have experienced this, was there anything specific that seemed to cause it (i.e. bowel movement, etc.)?
Also, did you undergo any sort of treatment to improve the situation?
It's usually from scar tissue sloughing off in the urine stream. It is common and expected. It usually goes away on its own and can be ignored. If the bleeding is copious and doesn't resolve, talk to a urologist.
Thanks for reply, "common and expected", ", usually goes away on its own", "can be ignored". I understand what you are saying here, so it suggests holding off on another cystoscopy if you had one in last 6 months. I do have intermittent blood with clots in urine and it stresses me since it's relatively new and 2 years after salvage IMRT. This has been going on roughly for about 4 months. I thought spicy/hot food and maybe a large bowel movement may encourage it. I can live with it, ballpark how long might this last under your expectations, I see what others are saying here. Thank you
Radiation cystitis is the correct term.
Proctitis is around back!!😝
And HBOT does a really good job at taking care of either one.
It happens to me at about the one year mark and again at the three year mark. Lasted a couple days each time then resolved. At 6 years now and hasn’t happened again. Both times I felt may have been worse due to me doing fairly heavy squats and deadlifts .
I have twice post radiotherapy, 18 and 30 months. Urologists says probably burnt bladder. I have an appointment next week to review scan.
Yes. I have this as well and it started about a month ago. I had a probe to confirm it was caused by damaged veins in the bladder. There are three options to resolve it. 1. Wait and see. In most cases it should resolve itself.
2. There is a gel they can apply to inside of bladder to dissolve the problem veins.
3. Hypobaric oxygen treatment to promote healing.
Apparently it can occur at any time after treatment. I discussed it with my urologist and we are going to wait it out and only consider taking action if it gets worse.
This is useful.
I had a lot of bleeding issues after radiation.
I peed a lot of blood for a while and had the bladder checked with a camera probe. The bleeding continued for a few months, but then healed by itself.
I also did bleed a lot when pooping (also for many months) and had to do argon treatment during colonoscopy where they burned a lot of wounds shut, which fixed the problem.
I have bleeding if I put to much pressure during bowel movements. I had a scan and cystoscopy which confirmed radiation damage to bladder neck.
Yes. I had radiation in 2019 and had this happen to me for the first time two weeks ago. The blood clotted so much that I had to have a catheter put in for a few days. In a follow-up with the urologist, the scope showed the inflamation and scarring around the exit of the bladder.
Sorry to hear what you are going through
When this happened to me three days in the Hospital and catheter
for a week
Only time bleeding occurs is during a bowel movement so I have
to be very careful stool softeners and no straining
also having catheter for a week caused slight incontinence
so try not to have catheter in too long if possible
also By accident I found a technique to get rid of the blood clots
and avoided having a catheter
When you have a clot and cannot urinate try to just relax and gently
rub in a circular motion in your groin which is where your bladder is
and after a few minutes you can start to urinate and avoid the catheter
I found out from my urologist this this is a known technique but
neither my Doctor or the ER told me about it
Hope this helps you
I had Proton and 3D conformal radiation in 2009, everything was fine for several years and then twice I had huge clots and lots of blood when I peed, went to my Uro and he took a look said I had some bad spots on my bladder, he went in and cauterized them and no more problems until around 20021. I went to the VA because my EGFR had fallen to around 60, they took a look and found kidney stones and a swollen left kidney. Went in and got some of the stones, had bleeding after the operation, plugged, ended up in the ER for a catheter. Later on they went in again several times and left stents in, I always had some bleeding with the stents, one time I plugged again and had to go to the ER for another catheter. Both urethers ended up blocked, had surgery for that in 2022. After surgery had stents and minor bleeding, did 30 HBOT, no problems since then. Hope it stays that way.
Greetings mort42,
If you wish to view other posts regarding your bleeding issue, just do a search of the H.U. history file using the search string "cystitis". There are tons of hits to view.
Would you please update your bio. All info is voluntary but helps you and helps us too. Thank you!!!
Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.
j-o-h-n
I had radiation 8 years ago and now have PCa and on occasion I still get blood in urine but mostly blood in the stool once every few weeks now, According to Doctors this is from initial radiation. Everything else checks out OK. Just need to keep an eye on it if it gets worse.
Click on your "Avatar" (the round circle you use for your UserID) and look at the top left of the screen and you will see a rectangular lightly shaded box labeled SEARCH HEALTHUNLOCK with a picture of a magnifying glass. Merely overlay the search healthunlock with the string (data) you wish to search for and hit the magnifying glass and off it goes hunting for your string.
Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.
j-o-h-n
Radiation Proctitis Tip
Radiation Proctitis - comments from those that have been diagnosed with chronic (>6 months post radiation).
Bleeding after salvage radiation 
Radiation proctitis 
