How to Perform a Testicular Self-Exam

If you're a man between the ages of 15 and 40, this monthly self-exam of your testicles can help detect testicular cancer at an early and very curable stage. The self-exam is simple to do and only takes a few minutes.

1. Take a warm bath or shower to relax the scrotum. This makes it easier to spot any abnormality.
2. Stand naked in front of a mirror.
3. Check the skin of your scrotum for swelling.
4. Feel the right testicle within your scrotal sac.
5. With your index and middle fingers under the testicle, thumbs placed on top, roll the testicle between the thumbs and fingers.
6. Find the epididymis, the soft, cordlike structure behind the testicle that collects and carries sperm.
7. Do not confuse the epididymis with a lump. Cancerous lumps usually are found on the sides of the testicle, but can also show up on the front. Lumps on the epididymis are not cancerous.
8. Feel for a lump on the surface of the testicle.
9. Repeat with the left testicle.
10. If you find a lump or swelling, see your doctor right away. The abnormality may not be cancer; it may be an infection. But if it is testicular cancer, it will spread if untreated.

External Sources The National Cancer Institute The Testicular Cancer Resource Center The American Cancer Society Dollinger M, Rosenbaum, EH, Tempero M., et al. Everyone's Guide to Cancer Therapy, Fourth Edition, Kansas City, Missouri: Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2002

This article was reviewed and updated June 2007.

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