'I had to have a third of my penis removed, but it saved my life'

A man has shared his life-and-death battle with an exceptionally rare form of cancer that forced him to have a third of his penis removed. Alastair Munro, 49, will appear on BBC2’s Surgeons: At The Edge Of Life tonight, May 6, to talk about his battle with penile cancer. He had noticed a small lump on the end of his penis which was getting bigger and went to see his GP about six weeks after it first appeared. Tests confirmed that he had cancer and he then faced a seven hour operation at the Western General Hospital, in Edinburgh, to remove the tumour plus some lymph nodes in his groin. Medics carried out a second operation six weeks later to remove more of the cancer. They were also able to reconstruct his penis using skin from his thigh. “I want to get the message across that if anyone notices there is something wrong in the penis or testicle area, like a spot or a lump, or they have problems urinating, they should never be embarrassed and should go to the GP straight away,” Alastair, who lives in Inverness, Scotland , said. “I think cancer is a horrible disease, often with no symptoms and so difficult to detect but I am only alive today due to my brilliant surgeon and the NHS - and the fact that I managed to spot something was wrong before it was too late. Penile cancer is incredibly rare and so little is generally known about it that I decided to take part in the BBC Scotland series which follows the whole story.” Alastair, a civil engineer, was given the all clear in February and will have more plastic surgery later this year. He has been supported by his best friend Richard Selvester, who appears on the BBC show alongside him, and the pair are raising money for male cancer charity orchid. Penile cancer is extremely rare and affects just 700 men in Britain a year. “If one person watches the programme, and realises that there is something wrong or not quite right with them in the ‘downstairs’ area, and then decides to go to his GP then Richard and I will have achieved our target,” he said. “They filmed the whole procedure and all the rest of it. And then after the recovery period they came back to the golf club and filmed us again. Earlier this year they showed us the whole episode. It’s quite graphic.” Richard added: “We’re lifelong friends and it’s been amazing seeing him contend with so many traumas at once. As he was preparing for the first operation back in 2024, his mother died. We had just met with the BBC at Kingussie Golf Club to talk about how scary it all was, with all our cards on the table, nothing being held back when his mother died of cancer. “Alastair has had a terrible time (but) nothing deterred him, though, in his battle with the disease and in the knowledge that it would ultimately be shared with millions of TV viewers. He is a remarkable guy and it’s wonderful to see him approaching his 50th birthday now as he gets the story across to the public, just as he wanted. “He speaks so well in the programme and desperately wants to raise awareness because penile cancer is such a rare form and so few people know what’s involved.”