A Vietnamese man was in late September admitted to hospital with a ‘broken’ penis reportedly from trying exotic positions in bed, doctors say.

The middle-aged male patient was admitted to Binh Dan Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City on September 25 with a swollen and bruised genital, its doctor Mai Ba Tien Dung said.

The 59-year-old man from south-central Vietnam’s Binh Thuan Province admitted that he was engaging in sexual intercourse with his partner when a ‘crack’ was heard coming from his erect penis.

Purple coloration then began to spread across his genital and scrotum, which prompted the patient to seek medical assistance at the hospital, according to the patient's account.

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan results at Binh Dan Hospital showed a two-centimeter tear and excessive bleeding at the right cavernous body of the patient’s penis around the fixed portion of the urethra.

A surgery was carried out the next day to stitch the patient’s fibrous envelope, which encloses the cavernous bodies.

According to doctor Dung, the breaking of cavernous bodies often occurs at full erection, the symptoms of which can include a clear ‘crack’ coming from the penis that is accompanied by a sharp pain at the penis stem.

Purple coloration around the pain area will follow and quickly spread across the length of the penis and to the patient’s scrotum, while the foreskin can also get swollen and cover the penis gland, Dung said.

Without timely surgery, the patient can suffer from a deformed and curved penis, erectile dysfunction, infected hematoma, arteriovenous fistula, formation of abscess cavities, pain during erection, and even high rates of impotence.

“The case of this 59-year-old patient is rare, occurring only once out of a thousand cases of broken penises recorded in medical literature,” Dung said.

The damages of this kind of injury are easy to miss and can lead to late complications that affect the patient’s quality of life without being examined by professionally trained physicians, the doctor warned.