Given the large number of people directly or indirectly affected by hypospadias, it seems strange that so little information is available to the general public.

A few articles have been written in general health magazines, male health magazines, or newspapers. Some articles have been published online. Only a very few television and radio programmes have explored this theme.

Obviously, there’s much more education needed about hypospadias and the various issues around it. For example, we would like to encourage people to think of the genital anatomy of boys and men as a continuum, on which an anatomic variation like hypospadias is primarily an expression of just another type of maleness, and not an abnormality or a defect.

Hypospadias is not included in the textbooks currently used for sex education in the classroom. Clearly it would be useful if hypospadias were presented in a textbook so that boys could learn about it during sex education lessons without feeling like some type of “freak”. We’d also like to see men’s health magazines featuring hypospadias from time to time so that everyone becomes more aware of this condition.