Young male with yellow shirt and helmet riding a mountain bike outdoors on a sunny day, shot with a tilt and shift lens Ljupco/Ljupco

Sustaining an erection for an ordinate amount of time has long been the dream of many a young man – but for one 22-year-old, it became something of a nightmare.

The man attended a Dublin hospital after suffering from an erection for seven whole weeks.

A keen mountain biker, her had sustained a straddle injury on the crossbar of his bike, resulting in an abnormal blood flow to his penis and a consequent priapism – an interminable erection.

The man only went to hospital after suffering from the problem for seven weeks, where he was told his ‘rigid erection’ could have caused a blood clot if it hadn’t been treated.




A report in the Irish Medical Journal described how several treatments were attempted and the man’s swelling finally subsided when doctors inserted gel foam and four tiny platinum coils at an abnormal connection between an artery and a vein that supplied blood to the man’s penis.

Doctors who treated the man at Dublin’s Tallaght Hospital said an examination ‘revealed no signs of injury, but penis was erect’.

They added that intercourse would have been ‘possible, but painful’ for the man during his ordeal.

Dr Ronan Browne, Consultant Intervention radiologist at Tallaght Hospital, told the Irish Examiner: ‘It was an anxious time for the patient as it would be for any young man.’