A man who spent six years with a penis on his arm due to a surgery complication has opened up about his struggles with the unusually placed appendage.
Malcolm MacDonald, from Thetford in Norfolk, said the organ fell off in 2014 after a blood infection caused it to rot.
The 47-year-old father said on Channel 4’s The Man With a Penis on His Arm on Tuesday night how doctors told him they could make a new one with skin grafted from his arm.
During the surgery, however, a lack of oxygen in his blood meant doctors had to abandon the procedure midway, leaving the new penis stuck to his left arm “temporarily”.
It ended up staying there for six years.
Mr MacDonald explained in the documentary how he came to be in the unfortunate position of needing a replacement.
Speaking before his surgery he said: “I'm an everyday man that does the same things everyday men do, but I don't have penis.”
He said his life fell apart after he became homeless.
“Twelve years ago had a job a nice partner, my baby comes along, relationship ain't too good, we ended up splitting up,” he said. “A friend of mine had a garage, got set up with a sofa and TV.”
Mr MacDonald went on to develop a long-term infection on his perineum which developed into sepsis.
He said: “My toes started going black, my penis started going black. I went to the toilet and it fell off.”
He said he threw it in a bin and doctors told him all they could do was treat the remaining stump.
For the next two years he became a recluse and, feeling “like a shadow of a man”, began drinking heavily.
Believing he would be left with a stump for life, he would drink 18 pints in a day, often starting in the morning.
Hope came almost two years later when his GP referred him to Professor David Ralph, an expert in phallus construction at University College Hospital in London.
Prof Ralph told Mr MacDonald he could have a new penis grafted – and doctors would design it to his specifications.
He was told he would be able to have a sex life with a pump in his scrotum to fill the organ with saline solution.
To make the penis, doctors took skin from his left arm to form the shape, also making a urethra in the skin. The arm was chosen because it has skin quality and sensation, they said.
But before they could attach it between his legs, doctors were forced to stop the surgery as Mr MacDonald had hypoxemia, a potentially fatal lack of oxygen in his blood.
The penis had to be connected to blood vessels in his arm to keep the tissue healthy.
The procedure to move it to his groin ended up being delayed by six years due to missed apointments, staff shortages and the pandemic.
Mr MacDonald said the appendage led to several difficult and embarrassment.
“I went to Waitrose, there was an old lady that needed some help, it fell out of the bandage and fell out on her head,” he said. “I could have given her a heart attack. When I'm cooking, it burns, I can't use the back hob.”
Last year he finally had a nine hour surgery to put it back in place.
Mr MacDonald is now hopefuly for the future, saying it could be “a turning point in my life.”
“Can you imagine six years of your life with a penis swinging on your arm?” he said. “It’s been a nightmare, but it’s gone now – the little bugger.”
