But the introduction of the penile prosthesis paled in comparison to British physiologist Gile Brindley's dramatic demonstration at the 1983 Annual Meeting of the AUA. Brindley closed his lecture by dropping his pants to reveal a perfectly-erect phenoxybenzamine-induced erection. Following Brindley's lecture demonstration, Adrian Zorgniotti began teaching patients self-injections with injectable phentolamine and papaverine, a drug touted in 1982 by French vascular surgeon Ronald Virag. In the meantime, two functional tests for penile circulation were developed: one was a duplex ultrasound test by Tom F. Lue at the University of California, San Francisco and the other was dynamic cavernosometry and cavernosography by Irwin Goldstein at Boston University.

By the mid- to late 1980s, patients would have their first self-injectable impotence drug, with FDA-approved alprostadil (prostaglandin-E1). Thereafter, physicians often prescribed a "triple-mix" of vasoactive drugs—papaverine prostaglandin, and phentolamine. By 1997, an innovative applicator—MUSE (Medicated Urethral System for Erection)—to facilitate prostaglandin absorption by the urethral mucosa was approved by the FDA.