I don't know any more about it than you guys. When I discussed the external cath with the urologist I confessed to my total ignorance. He said "we know just what you need to get set up, let us handle it." The nurse said that they handle cases like that all the time and would send in a prescription for me to include everything I would need, leg bag, bed bag, tubing, condoms, etc, but that I could change things later. The discussion and activity shifted to getting me samples of intermittent catheters and I forgot to ask what they were prescribing! All is to arrive via UPS.
Inconimiss, I do understand from what I have read that condom cath users are divided on the subject and that some never found a good solution.
Also, I explained to my wife that it seemed that condom caths worked usually worked well until there was an embarrassing catastrophic failure. I mentioned that no one knows when I have a diaper leak, but everyone would know if the condom cath failed.
I expect to have a learning curve and a lot of experimentation to work out the bugs. Hopefully, the payback will be that it makes it a little easier to TRAVEL.
My wife and I enjoy cruising. Despite my bowel incontinence, that gives us a fixed base of operations from which we can venture forth on shore excursions and return to our cabin without repacking every night. Due to my age I would like to work on a couple of bucket list items that are fairly lengthy cruises - possibly 20 to 30 days each. I have done that when I was only bowel incontinent and only juggled the enemas and two diapers per day. However, with the added urinary incontinence, the volume of diapers required would not be practical. Therefore the possible advantage of intermittent cathing and using a condom cath. The added flexibility provides me with some options for travel. Nonetheless, given my back problems everything is TBD.
--John