prostate-report.org

Prostate cancer screening requires common sense

Admin — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:58:25 +0000

The blood test that screens for prostate cancer often allows doctors to find the cancer at such an early stage that the disease may not need to be treated. Unfortunately, they are often unable to determine which cancers would remain slow-growing and which would grow quickly and should be treated.

Therefore, patients of all ages should discuss with their physicians whether they should be screened for prostate cancer. I would argue that a healthy 75-year-old is more appropriate for screening than is a 62-year-old who has some other disease that will likely take his life in a matter of a few years.

As is true for most reports on medical decision making, the best choices are made by understanding the full story.

Obese Prostate Cancer Patients May Benefit More From Brachytherapy

Admin — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 12:52:34 +0000

Brachytherapy, also called seed implants, may be a more beneficial treatment than surgery or external beam radiation therapy for overweight or obese prostate cancer patients, according to a study published in the August issue of the International Journal of Radiation Oncology*Biology*Physics, the official journal of the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology. [ continue to read ]

Consistent PSA Screening Results In Better Prognosis

Admin — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 13:47:06 +0000

Recently, PSA or prostate-specific antigen, screening made headlines when a US Preventive Task Force recommended that men over the age 75 discontinue screening for prostate cancer.

While there is currently no definitive data regarding improvement in survival from screening for prostate cancer using the PSA test, researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) have now shown that men who had been screened for a longer period of time using PSA tests were less likely to have adverse features of prostate cancer at the time of diagnosis.

These results are published in the August 15, 2008 issue of Cancer.

Desk jobs increase risk of prostate cancer

Admin — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 14:08:49 +0000

MEN who work sitting at a desk are more likely to develop prostate cancer than manual workers, a study has shown.

Scientists looked at whether levels of physical activity in the workplace were linked with tumours and found that having a desk job significantly increased the risks.

Men who worked as civil servants, teachers or in office jobs were much more likely to get cancer than those who spend much of their day on their feet, such as labourers, bakers, and barbers.

The findings, published in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention, confirm the benefits of regular exercise in reducing the risk of prostate cancer.

Alternative Vaccine Strategy Shows Promise in Prostate Cancer Patients

Admin — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 14:06:46 +0000

Therapeutic cancer vaccines are designed to treat cancer by stimulating the immune system to attack tumor cells without harming normal cells.

New research indicates that giving patients a continuous low dose of an immune system booster, a method known as metronomic dosing, as part of a therapeutic prostate cancer vaccine strategy is safe and produces similar immune responses and fewer side effects than the more common dosing method, which is not well tolerated by many patients. This study, led by researchers at that National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, was published in the Aug. 15, 2008, issue of Clinical Cancer Research.

The vaccine used in this study is designed to stimulate an immune response against prostate-specific antigen (PSA), a protein produced by the prostate that is often found at elevated levels in the blood of men who have prostate cancer and some non-cancerous prostate conditions. In the study, researchers examined the side effects and immune responses of patients treated with a three-pronged approach: the vaccine, radiation therapy, and an alternative dosing regimen of an immune system booster, interleukin-2 (IL-2). The patients all had localized prostate cancer, had not undergone surgery to remove the prostate, and were candidates for radiation therapy as their primary form of treatment.

Vitamin D doesn’t cut prostate cancer risk

Admin — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 15:18:05 +0000

U.S. National Cancer Institute researchers set out to see if vitamin D might protect against prostate cancer, the second most frequently diagnosed cancer in men worldwide. They tracked vitamin D concentrations in the blood of 749 men diagnosed with prostate cancer and 781 men who did not have the disease.

They found no association between higher levels of the vitamin and a reduced prostate cancer risk. The findings hinted at a possible increased risk for aggressive prostate cancer in men with higher blood concentration of vitamin D, but this link was not statistically significant, the researchers said.

Levels of vitamin D were measured in a blood sample provided by the men when they entered the study. Those with prostate cancer were diagnosed one to eight years after the blood samples were given, the researchers said

Seattle researchers find genetic scrap in prostate cancer that could yield a test

Admin — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 11:34:19 +0000

In the study, reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, cancer researchers in Seattle reported they isolated dozens of microRNAs from human blood plasma, the liquid left after cells are removed. Using mice implanted with human prostate cancer cells, they identified microRNA sequences specific to the cancer. In blind blood tests, researchers easily identified the mice that had been implanted with cancer cells by the presence of the microRNA sequences.

Existing laboratory tests can identify the genetic molecules, called microRNAs, even if present in only minute amounts in a blood sample. Researchers say that suggests the microRNAs could help to detect prostate cancer early and accurately.

Precisely targeted radiation therapy can control limited prostate cancer spread

Admin — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 10:05:55 +0000

In the August 15, 2008, issue of Clinical Cancer Research, (published online August 12) researchers from the University of Chicago Medical Center report that precisely targeted radiation therapy can eradicate all evidence of disease in selected patients with cancer that has spread to only a few sites.

Recent improvements in tumor detection and precise image-guided radiation therapy, however, have made simultaneous treatment of multiple tumor sites with radiation feasible.

The technique could also be applied after chemotherapy, the authors suggest, in cases where the drugs had eliminated most the smaller cancer, leaving only a few larger tumors behind.

One-fifth of men under 50 do prostate test

Admin — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 10:01:31 +0000

One-fifth of men under age 50 report having had a prostate specific antigen test to detect prostate cancer in the previous year, U.S. researchers say.

Researchers at Duke University Medicine’s Prostate Center said only one in three young black men reported having had a PSA test in the previous year.

Surgery Helps With Prostate Cancer, Sometimes

Admin — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 09:59:09 +0000

The latest update from a European study that has followed men with prostate cancer for more than a decade leaves the debate about the advantages of aggressive treatment versus “watchful waiting” undecided.

The advantage in survival seen for men who underwent surgery to remove the prostate disappeared after 10 years. While deaths attributed to cancer continued to be lower among those having surgery, the overall death rate for both groups was the same, according to the researchers with the Scandinavian Prostate Cancer Group.

The meaning of the study for men now being diagnosed with prostate cancer is uncertain, because the study began before the use of testing for prostate-specific antigen, today’s primary method of diagnosis, the researchers added.

The findings were published online Aug. 12 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.