Yes, I have a success story. My story is not directly comparable to yours, but I think it is similar enough to be relevant, it may help your father. My problems were quite short term. A very helpful district nurse changed my life when it comes to catheters (of all the medical professionals I have seen over the last couple of years she is the one who made the most change to my quality of life), remember consultants you see once every few months, radiotherapists once a day for a few weeks, but you need to piss several times every single day of your life, so getting that right makes all the difference.
My first problem was urinary retention, which later lead to my diagnosis of prostate cancer. As a result of the urinary retention I ended up at A and E being fitted with an indwelling catheter. After a week Twoc (trial without catheter) was arranged. I had a few problems in that week, white discharge at tip of penis, blood, pain at tip of penis were amongst them. The fear that when sleeping a pipe would disconnect and things would get messy were all reasons I was looking forward to the twoc and being rid of the thing. I guess I ought to mention that if this catheter was going to be long term, sex was going to be a problem, not at the top of the list in an emergency, but when things may drag on for months it could be an issue.
BTW I did actually find not having to get up in the night for a pee rather good, and when I went down the pub with my friends it was really convenient never having an urgent need to piss, just discreetly checking if the bag was full and then opening a tap (in the cubicle) when necessary.
Anyway the day of Twoc arrived, but things did not go well, basically I could not pee. So as arranged I called the district nurse back, with the prospect of a new indwelling catheter. I must admit my thoughts on the twoc failure were that I probably had an inflamed urethra after a week with a tube down it, and maybe given a bit longer may be a day or two to recover and all would be sorted, but of course how would I pee whilst recovering (catch 22). However she suggested "Clean Intermittent Self Catheterisation (CISC)", for which you are supplied with onetime disposable tubes (box of 90 is assumed to last a month, but just order as many as you need). This is not for everyone you need a normal amount of dexterity, and more particularly you need not to be frightened of the somewhat unpleasant feeling (not actually painful) of inserting a tube down your penis.
I was taught how to do this in about 20 mins (we are talking practical). I was told to do this whenever I needed to pee and just before bed and first thing in the morning. I actually only needed to do it for about a day and a half and then I was back to normal. The really important thing is that I now had nearly 90 tubes available and if I had urinary retention again I could now sort it out myself.
So once your fathers immediate urinary tract infection is cleared up, if he can do CISC he will not have to tolerate an indwelling catheter, he may then after a few days be able to piss quite normally, but if urinary retention starts again he can revert to CISC, until it all clears up and he is back to normal peeing, or if things are not going well for several days then he can call the district nurse or go to A&E and get appropriate treatment. The important thing about CISC is that it gives a breathing space, where at least the bladder can be emptied with out going for the full indwelling solution.
After HDR Brachy RT, I once again found myself with an indwelling catheter, and due to a bank holiday and no consultants being around, the indwelling solution had to stay until I could find someone to confirm that it would be OK to do CISC post RT. Anyway after a few days of CISC all was back to normal.
I now still do CISC about once every three months just to keep in practice, so I know I can do it if I have urinary retention again. Believe me CISC changed my life, it put me back in control.