Minimally invasive therapies for benign prostatic hyperplasia in the new millennium: long-term data.

Over the last decade, a number of minimally invasive therapies have been investigated for the treatment of symptomatic benign prostatic hyperplasia. Most of these therapies use thermal energy to ablate prostatic tissue. The major common problem with all these new minimally invasive therapies has been the lack of long-term data concerning efficacy, re-intervention rates and side-effects. We present here the available long-term data on these alternative minimally invasive therapies for benign prostatic hyperplasia and their current place in the urologist's armamentarium.