FORBES: Provenge boosted survival by 4.1 months, a result unlikely due to chance, says this background feature in Forbes Magazine that looks at the latest trial of the promising prostate cancer drug. Forty-two percent of Provenge patients were alive at three years, compared to 23% who received placebo. READ MORE>
PRNEWSWIRE: Vast improvements in prostate cancer recognition, management and treatment are needed, according to influential prostate cancer groups, speaking at the American Urological Association annual meeting. READ MORE>
PROSTABLOG NZ: The American Urological Association’s newly revised PSA best practice guidelines have just been posted on the association’s website and there are a couple of significant changes. The document says these are: The age for obtaining a baseline PSA has been lowered to 40 years; the current policy no longer recommends a single, threshold value of PSA which should prompt prostate biopsy. Rather, the decision to proceed to prostate biopsy should be based primarily on PSA and DRE results, but should take into account multiple factors including free and total PSA, patient age, PSA velocity, PSA density, family history, ethnicity, prior biopsy history and co-morbidities.
PROSTABLOG NZ (April 30): The Ministry of Health says it will be reviewing the two big, long-term trials in Europe and the US that looked at the effectiveness of prostate testing and screening over about a decade. READ MORE>
PROSTABLOG NZ (April 30): The NZ Cancer Society will review its position on the vexed question of a national screening programme for prostate cancer. It will be the the first review since the society stated its opposition to screening in 1999. READ MORE>
PROSTABLOG NZ (April 29): The Americans have moved closer to the idea of national screening for prostate cancer, with a leading body recommending PSA tests for men aged 40. Although the American Urological Association – which issued a new statement on testing this week – doesn’t actually say a national screening programme should now be implemented by the US government, its new stance goes further than previous guidelines. If they are, the question arises: should New Zealand be reviewing its “no national prostate screening” policy yet again? READ MORE>
XCONOMY SEATTLE: Dendreon’s immune-stimulating therapy for prostate cancer, called Provenge, was able to improve median survival time by 4.1 months, and lowered the risk of death by 22.5 percent, according to long-awaited clinical trial results presented at the American Urological Association annual meeting today. READ MORE>
FUTURE PUNDIT: GlaxoSmithKline PLC’s Avodart – dual 5-alpha-reductase inhibitor dutasteride which inhibits the conversion of testosterone into dihydrotesterone – cuts the risk of prostate cancer (and the same drug is also used to slow hair loss). In a study of 8,231 patients with increased risk of prostate cancer, 22.5% of men taking Avodart were diagnosed with prostate cancer after four years, compared with 29% who were taking a placebo. But it did not cut the incidence of high grade tumors. READ MORE>
BIO-MEDICINE: Dutasteride (Avodart), a commonly prescribed drug to treat benign prostatic hyperplasia (enlarged prostate), has been shown to lower the risk of prostate cancer by 23 percent in men with an increased risk of the disease, according to results of an international clinical trial presented yesterday at the American Urological Association annual meeting in Chicago. READ MORE>
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF HEMATOLOGY/ONCOLOGY: Can combination therapy with Celebrex and Lipitor effectively treat patients with early-stage prostate cancer? A new study at The Cancer Institute of New Jersey (CINJ) will explore that question. READ MORE>
NATURAL PRODUCTS: A combination therapy of vitamin E, selenium and soy does not prevent the progression from high-grade prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (HGPIN) to prostate cancer, according to new research from Canada. READ MORE>
NEW YORK TIMES: Eating red meat most days of the week increases the chances of getting prostate cancer, say studies reported in this article. In the large Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial, among the 35,534 men in the study, those who consumed at least three servings of fish a week had half the risk of advanced prostate cancer compared with men who rarely ate fish. READ MORE>
PROSTABLOG: What did the New England Journal of Medicine publish on March 26 that led to such an upsurge in renewed debate about prostate cancer screening? Read the full articles (one on a long-term US study, the other on a similar European one) HERE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: The data from two trials now provides compelling evidence for the value of 5α-reductase inhibitor therapy in the prevention of prostate cancer in men believed to be at significant risk for this disease. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: New studies at the AUA annual meeting (this week) do seem to suggest predictive benefits to testing, writes Mike Scott in his cautious analysis of the new AUA guidelines issued yesterday. READ MORE>
ASSOCIATED PRESS: An influential doctors group is backing off its call for annual tests after age 50 to screen for prostate cancer, but says men should be offered a baseline PSA test at age 40. “Many men do not need yearly screening,” but each man’s risk should be individually assessed, said Dr. Peter Carroll, who led the panel that wrote the American Urological Association’s new guidelines. They are being issued today at the group’s annual meeting in Chicago. The new stance brings the group more in line with advice from other experts, who say annual screening is leading to unnecessary biopsies and treatment with little proof that it saves lives. Screening involves a physical exam and a blood test for a substance called PSA. READ MORE>
EXMAX HEALTH: The American Urological Association (AUA) today issued new clinical guidance – which directly contrasts recent recommendations issued by other major groups – about prostate cancer screening, asserting that the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test should be offered to well-informed, men aged 40 years or older who have a life expectancy of at least 10 years. READ MORE>
SCIENCE BLOG: Prostate cancer patients who undergo therapy to decrease testosterone levels increase their risk of developing bone- and heart-related side effects compared to patients who do not take these medications, according to a new analysis. READ MORE>
NEWS-MEDICAL.NET: When it comes to worrying about the recurrence of prostate cancer, male patients worry less than their female spouses or partners, say researchers at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: More research is needed to help decide the best form of treatment to prevent bone loss and fractures in men with advanced prostate cancer. Two studies of the use of toremifene and denosumab in androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) were presented at the American Urological Association annual meeting in Chicago last weekend. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: Given the available tests for prostate cancer today, we need to rely on risk calculators rather than PSA data alone to define those patients in need of biopsy, a prostate expert told the American Urological Association annual meeting. His was one of several views presented. This report from Mike Scott of New Prostate Cancer Info-link makes the comment: “We do not expect this debate to be resolved any time soon! ” READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: Men who have a series of biopsies and their Gleason score changes are not necessarily at greater risk of prostate cancer, says a study of 366 men over nine years. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: New research that tested criteria commonly used to decide if prostate cancer is “insignificant” – Epstein’s Criteria – has challenged the validity of this method and indicates better markers are needed to be sure. READ MORE>
HULIQ NEWS: Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a new technique that may improve robotic prostate surgery by using a second robot for taking three-dimensional ultrasound images of the prostate and surrounding structures during the procedure. READ MORE>
IN THE NEWS.UK: Prostate cancer could soon be added to the exhaustive list of health risks reduced by the much celebrated super-food pomegranate, scientists have claimed. A report presented to the annual meeting of the American Urological Association says US researchers have found drinking pomegranate juice helps stop the cancer returning in people who have already been treated once. READ MORE>
ADVANCEWEB.COM: Degarelix, a new drug for treatment of prostate cancer, has gained FDA approval. A gonadotropin releasing hormone (GnRH) receptor inhibitor, the drug is intended to treat patients with advanced cancer, and slows the growth and progression of the cancer by suppressing testosterone, which plays an important role in the continued growth of prostate cancer, according to FDA officials. READ MORE>
REUTERS: Cholesterol-lowering statin drugs may protect men against prostate cancer and other urological complaints. A clinical study following 2447 men over 15 years found those taking statins were less likely to develop prostate cancer. Just 6% of men on statins were diagnosed with prostate cancer, with non-statin users three times more likely to develop the disease, Mayo Clinic researchers have reported at the American Urological Association meeting in Chicago. READ MORE>
PROSTABLOG: World debate on whether we should have prostate cancer screening – using the PSA blood test and digital exams – has flared in the past month following publication of two big studies, which now appear seriously flawed. READ MORE>
HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL: Two international and large randomised studies provide the most convincing evidence thus far that PSA based testing does nothing or meaningfully little to reduce the death rate from prostate cancer and confirm many earlier studies that came to the same conclusions. In this VIDEO, Marc Garnick, MD, discusses the implications. VIEW HERE>
CHICAGO TRIBUNE: Prostate cancer is one of 11 common medical conditions whose treatments need to be investigated to clarify which options are best, says a panel of four US medical experts. Their views come as the US government prepares to spend $1.1 billion comparing the effectiveness of various medical treatments. READ MORE>
WALL STREET JOURNAL: Data from a four-year study of 8000 prostate patients is due to be released at the American Urological Association meeting in Chicago tomorrow (Monday). Of particular interest is that a up to 6800 patients were treated with the PCA3 prostate-cancer test. READ MORE>
WEB-MED: Using gene therapy, researchers have re-educated patients’ own immune systems to attack prostate tumors in the body. In the first two patients treated, the experimental treatment reduced PSA levels by 50% to 75%. READ MORE>
NEWS OK: The PSA test remains controversial because of three issues every screening test must confront: the biology of the disease, in this case prostate cancer; the number of false positives and false negatives; and the method of following up the false positives. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: Two stories in the New York Times today offer a public forum to researchers who believe that the US has been making “fundamental mistakes” in fighting cancer. READ MORE> and MORE>
BIO-MEDICINE: A new Harvard Medical School website provides multiple perspectives on how best to treat prostate disease, including prostate cancer, benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), and prostatitis, as well as erectile dysfunction and low testosterone levels. READ MORE>
REUTERS: The presence of multiple single nucleotide polymorphisms (DNA variations) associated with increased prostate cancer risk, coupled with a positive family history, accurately identify men at high risk for prostate cancer who might benefit from aggressive chemo-prevention with agents such as finasteride (drug treatment). READ MORE>
NEWS, ARTICLES & MEDICAL JOURNALS: Gene therapy comes as a powerful approach to specifically treat advanced prostate cancer, say the authors of a Brazilian research paper called Molecular Aspects of Prostate Cancer: Implications for future directions. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: We already know that lots of mutations may be associated with risk for prostate cancer, but it may be extremely difficult to identify which gene variations really have a clearly causative or prognostic role in prostate cancer management for the future. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: Prostate cancer control following targeted focal therapy (TFT) using cryotherapy or high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) should now be considered promising, according to a new study. The authors say TFT provides an alternative to active surveillance and more aggressive treatments for patients with low-risk tumors. READ MORE>
SCIENCE BLOG: A US PhD student is using 3D methods to study the way cancer cells escape from the prostate through the bloodstream to form tumour colonies, most often in the spine and long bones. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: The long-term durability of erectile function after brachytherapy treatment for prostate cancer depends on a wide range of factors, including age, type of therapy, other medical conditions, etc, according to a seven-year study. The authors note that radiation [doses that spare] proximal penile structures, plus early penile rehabilitation, may further improve results. READ MORE>
NEW YORK TIMES: President Barack Obama, discussing his plans for health care, has vowed to find “a cure” for cancer in our time and said that, as part of the economic stimulus package, he would increase federal money for cancer research by a third for the next two years. READ MORE>
BIO-MEDICINE: About 400 cancer therapy specialists from 100 countries will meet next week in Vienna to discuss modern techniques in radiation treatment of cancer. READ MORE>
PR-WEB: A new US book on prostate cancer, touted as the most up-to-date available, is being donated free to prostate cancer organisations. The new patient guidebook, The Dattoli Blue Ribbon Prostate Cancer Solution, was published last month, coauthored by Michael J. Dattoli, MD, the founder and Physician-in-Chief of Florida’s Dattoli Cancer Center & Brachytherapy Research Institute, and Jennifer Cash, ARNP, OCN. READ MORE>
TULSA WORLD: “Unfortunately for a lot of them, it’s kind of a private thing,” says Tulsan prostate survivor Kirk Bailey. “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, but I think a lot of guys are embarrassed by admitting they have prostate cancer.” READ MORE>
CHRON.COM/AP: Statistics show occurrences of prostate cancer in black men is 238 percent higher than the disease among white men. READ MORE>
PR -NEWSWIRE: As a non-invasive treatment for prostate cancer, CyberKnife radiosurgery can provide many patients with a painless alternative to surgery. Using pinpoint accuracy to deliver high doses of radiation to moving targets such as the prostate, CyberKnife radiosurgery is typically complete in five or fewer brief outpatient visits. Other radiation delivery techniques typically require 40 daily treatments that can amount to a two month treatment regimen. READ MORE>
PROSTATE CANCER WEBSITE: Chemotherapy is not commonly used to treat prostate cancer, but there are two specific sets of circumstance where chemotherapy may be the best choice. READ MORE>
PROSTATE CANCER WEBSITE: Both during and after your prostate cancer treatment, you should be sure to ask your doctor whether you should be taking vitamins or not during your treatment, especially if you are undergoing radiation therapy. READ MORE>
CANCER CONSULTANTS.COM: Men who received two sessions of stress management before undergoing radical prostatectomy for early-stage prostate cancer reported fewer mood problems before surgery and better quality of life after surgery than men who received usual care. READ MORE>
MEDSCAPE TODAY: One of the biggest issues in prostate cancer is differentiating between men who have aggressive tumours that could be fatal and men who have indolent tumours that might never become clinically significant. READ MORE>
MEDSCAPE TODAY: Vietnam veterans who undergo radical prostatectomy and who were exposed to Agent Orange are at increased risk for biochemical recurrence of prostate cancer. READ MORE>
FORBES: Shares of Dendreon Corp gained on Monday, bucking the broader market, as a Lazard Capital analyst upgraded shares on the sales potential for the prostate cancer drug Provenge. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: THE US Prostate Cancer Foundation will hold a roundtable discussion this week entitled “Discovery & Challenge: The State of Prostate Cancer Research.” READ MORE>
MEN’S HEALTH: Is prostate cancer being “over-diagnosed”? Right now, there doesn’t seem to be a clear answer, according to this analysis of the latest big study. But there are currently studies being conducted to try to determine when prostate cancer screenings should be offered, which tumours are the worrisome ones and those that are not. READ MORE
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO-LINK: An article developed by HealthDay for U.S. News & World Report carries the headline “A ‘Smart Bomb’ for Prostate Cancer?” The question mark at the end was a good idea, because it is clear to even a half-awake reader that the supposed smart bomb isn’t so smart at all. READ MORE>
AP: Prostate cancer has been left behind in the race for personalised medicine but that may be changing: Doctors are starting to attempt gene-guided treatment for men with advanced disease. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFOLINK: PROSTATE tumour biology can be altered by a vegan low-fat diet or by eliminating simple carbohydrates accompanied by weight loss, according to a review of recent literature on dietary interventions. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFOLINK: IMPROVEMENTS in the quality of conventional ultrasound needle biopsy – new methods that complement conventional TRUS (trans-rectal ultrasound) – are opening the door to earlier and better targeted diagnosis of prostate cancer, says a German study. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO LINK: A NEW Swedish study supports the view that “watch and wait” may be the best strategy for men with low grade, low risk, early stage prostate cancer, compared to active intervention. The data also seem to suggest that available treatment strategies are of limited value in men with higher grade and higher risk disease. READ MORE>
DRUGS.COM: Researchers were able to shrink prostate cancer cells in mice using a new drug delivery method that combines imaging with chemotherapy in a single agent. READ MORE>
PROSTATE CANCER TREATMENT BLOG: In the past, it was most frequently encountered in men over 70, and many of those men died of other causes before their prostate cancer could kill them. However, that is certainly is not true today. Three developments have changed things considerably. READ MORE>
NEW PROSTATE CANCER INFO LINK: IF the drug sipleucel-T (Provenge) can be used to extend patient survival in patients with hormone-refractory prostate cancer, then it may also have significant effects on patients with earlier stages of prostate cancer. READ MORE>
PUB MED: Although US guidelines recommend discussing the risks and benefits of prostate cancer screening, physicians report varying practice styles. READ MORE>
US COMPETITIVE ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE: RESEARCHERS announced very favourable results for the drug Provenge at this week’s meeting of the American Association of Cancer Research. But that only highlights the shortcomings of the Food and Drug Administration, which has refused to approve the drug, despite previous studies indicating its safety and effectiveness. READ MORE>
NATURE NEWS: Genetically engineered immune cells may have helped two patients with advanced prostate cancer to fight the disease, preliminary results suggest. READ MORE>
AFP: SCIENTISTS have linked a common genetic variation to the development of prostate cancer, according to a study published this week. READ MORE>
PRESS RELEASE POINT: Prostate Seed Institute, a Texas based non-surgical care center, has started treating prostate cancer patients with the latest Rapid Arc(TM) radiotherapy technology. The IMRT treatment, which takes about 90 seconds, is delivered significantly faster than any other regional facilities where treatment time can last 20 minutes or longer. READ MORE>
WWW.PUB-MED.GOV: A 3-D ultrasound TRUS-guided biopsy system translates to a more frequent detection of prostate cancer among patients undergoing an initial prostate biopsy than a subsequent one, a US study shows. READ MORE>
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA: EFFORTS to enhance trust among men who are diagnosed with prostate cancer and the medical profession should target African-American men, men with fewer socio-economic resources, and men with lower perceptions of inter-dependence, says a US study. READ MORE>
BLOG – TEN26 SURVIVOR: Patrick Baxter has developed a reputation as an ardent advocate for annual prostate cancer examinations. The key to this type of cancer, as with most, is early detection. So it’s a message he wants all men to hear. READ MORE>
FORBES: PROSTATE, brain and pancreatic cancer are some of the specific targets of new research into T-cells described at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research. READ MORE>
PROSTATE CANCER: TWO primary classification systems are used to describe the stages of prostate cancer. Depending on which hospital or physician you are seeing for your prostate cancer care, either or both could be used. It is important to have a basic understanding of the two systems and what they describe. READ MORE>
WALL STREET JOURNAL: A US biopharmaceutical company has announced that treatment with its experimental drug, PEGPH20, significantly delayed tumor growth in breast and prostate cancer models. PEGPH20, which is still under trial, targets and degrades the hyaluronan (HA) coating that surrounds certain solid tumor cells. READ MORE> and HERE>
TELEGRAPH.CO.NZ: TRIBUTES have been paid to JG Ballard, the acclaimed author, who died after a lengthy battle with prostate cancer. For some reason known only to themselves, Wellington’s daily morning paper, the Dominion Post, failed to mention prostate cancer in its story today. READ MORE>
SCIENCE DAILY: Veterans exposed to Agent Orange are at increased risk of aggressive recurrence of prostate cancer, researchers report. READ MORE>
US PROSTATE CANCER FOUNDATION: FOR those who haven’t caught up with it yet, here’s some analysis of the New England Journal of Medicine report on prostate cancer research. READ MORE>
HEALTHY LIFE WITH BLOGGING: FREQUENT masturbation in young men is linked to higher risk of early prostate cancer, but it lowers prostate cancer risk for men in their 50s, a study shows. READ MORE>
SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE: A PROMINENT US basketball coach reveals he is a cancer survivor, and he figures the more people know about the disease, the better. Hiding is not educational. READ MORE>
KEVINMD.COM: EVIDENCE is insufficient to fully endorse prostate cancer screening in younger men and men over the age of 75, says the US Preventive Services Task Force. And a recent study from the National Institutes of Health found that, after 7 to 10 years of follow-up, screening men with a prostate specific antigen blood test (PSA) and a digital rectal exam increased diagnosis of the disease, but did not reduce deaths. READ MORE>
RECORDER & TIMES: ANOTHER statistic helps patients decide about the value of the PSA test: 1,410 men have to be screened by the PSA test, and an additional 48 men treated, to prevent one prostate cancer death. This means that a massive screening program would have only a modest effect on mortality and some men would get treatment and complications they didn’t need. READ MORE>
PROSTATE CANCER (website): THE top 10 myths about prostate cancer include claims a lot of men get it but few die, it affects only elderly men, and if you don’t have symptoms like urination problems then you don’t have it. All are untrue. READ MORE>
PROSTATE CANCER (website): SOME studies have shown that men who have had a vasectomy are more likely to be diagnosed with prostate cancer. But multiple studies have been performed (many of which were quite large and more carefully constructed) that have shown no association between prior vasectomy and prostate cancer. They found that men with prior vasectomies did not have elevated rates of prostate cancer than the average man. READ MORE>
NATURAL NEWS: JUST how good are fish oils, flaxseed oils and other omega-3s at preventing prostate cancer? According to the experts quoted below, they may represent some of the most powerful anti-cancer nutrients available today. READ MORE>
BLISS TREE.COM: ACCORDING to a new study, men with Type 2 Diabetes “are at less risk of developing prostate cancer than men without diabetes”. READ MORE>
YOUR INFO GUIDE: THOSE men who stay active can significantly cut down on their risk getting prostate cancer. In fact the more aerobic the exercise the better; walking, hiking, swimming and bike riding were some of the examples given in a study by Harvard Medical School. READ MORE>
ELEMENTS4HEALTH (website): OBESITY is associated with an 80% increase in the risk of high-grade, aggressive prostate cancer, according to the findings from a randomised, controlled clinical trial. READ MORE>
HEALTH CARE BLOG (Sydney): A SINGLE rogue cell triggers prostate cancer, according to a study of 33 autopsies in the US. READ MORE>
CANCER CONSULTANTS.COM: PROVENGE, a drug with promising results for men with advanced prostate cancer, has already been turned down twice by the US FDA, but the latest phase three trial data may sway it. READ MORE>
PROSTATE RUMINATE BLOG: THESE URLs (links) are full of useful information for the more serious minded wishing to explore the full bag of prostate cancer treatments, medical science paraphernalia and the conventional medical approach regarding prostate cancer prognosis. READ MORE>
WALL STREET JOURNAL: PROSTATE cancer patients face a tough decision: Should they treat what may be a harmless cancer with surgery or radiation — and run a high risk of impotence or incontinence? Or should they wait to see whether the cancer spreads and hope they can catch it while it’s still treatable? READ MORE>
MED-PAGE TODAY: A vitamin D analog was well tolerated in combination with docetaxel (Taxotere) in men with hormone-refractory prostate cancer, the drug’s developer said. READ MORE>
GUARDIAN: UK scientists claim research into “cutting edge nanotechnology” could pave the way for development of a new strategy for the early diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer. READ MORE> and HERE> and HERE>
CHARLOTTE SUN: A US prostate support group gives its members brown seaweed concentrate because it seems to lower post-treatment PSA levels and helps with frequent urination problems. READ MORE>
EARTH TIMES: Bill Rodgers, former number-one ranked runner in the world, joins the field in Monday’s Boston Marathon – running to raise awareness for prostate cancer. Rodgers has a radical prostatectomy last year. READ MORE>
MAIL ON LINE (UK): UK researchers claim a once-a-day pill that shrink sadvanced prostate cancer tumours will be on the market within three years. READ MORE>
URO TODAY: A group of Spanish prostate patients has been used to trial a “quality of life” survey aimed at comparing the experiences of those undergoing radiotherapy to those getting hormone treatment. READ MORE>
BIO-MEDICINE: Based on the results of the European Randomised Study for Screening of Prostate Cancer, the EAU has formulated a position statement regarding prostate cancer screening in Europe, and the subsequent actions to be taken by health professionals and health authorities. READ MORE> and HERE>
NEW YORK TIMES, WALL STREET JOURNAL and OTHERS: A prostate cancer drug – Provenge – developed by the Seattle biotechnology company Dendreon prolonged the lives of men in a decisive clinical trial. The trial on 512 men with metastatic prostate cancer showed the vaccine significantly improved the odds of survival from prostate cancer compared to a placebo. READ MORE> and HERE> and HERE> and HERE> and HERE> and HERE> and HERE>
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA: TWO major, long-awaited studies on prostate cancer were released on March 19, and both sharply questioned the conventional wisdom about treating the disease. According to the studies, screening men for prostate cancer provides little or no benefit in saving lives. READ MORE>
REUTERS: Hormone therapy for advanced prostate cancer for more than five years is significantly associated with better overall survival and disease-free survival than is shorter duration therapy. READ MORE>
THINKING MADE EASY.COM: External beam radiation has proven successful in the treatment of localised prostate cancer and is associated with a success rate comparable to surgery. READ MORE>CHARLOTTE BUSINESS JOURNAL: A US medical-device company believes its high-intensity focused ultra-sound treatment for prostate cancer will become the preferred option for patients nationwide. READ MORE>
NEXCURA: CANCERFACTS.COM: A NEW therapy for a particularly deadly form of advanced prostate cancer – using new drugs called MDV3100 and RD162 – is showing promising results in early clinical trials involving patients whose disease has become resistant to current drugs, researchers say. MDV3100 lowered prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels. READ MORE>
MODERN MEDICINE: Findings from a series of pre-clinical studies show that digoxin – also known as Digitalis, a purified cardiac glycoside extracted from the foxglove plant – can affect tumour biology and interfere with tumour growth and may provide a basis for conducting clinical trials to investigate a potential role of the drug in prostate and other cancers. READ MORE>
REUTERS: OFFICIAL approval is a step closer in the US for the first cancer immunotherapy – a drug to fight cancer by stimulating the immune system to attack cancer cells – after the latest trials on more than 500 men with late-stage prostate cancer. READ MORE>
HemOnc TODAY: Adding radiotherapy to endocrine treatment in men with locally advanced prostate cancer increased urinary, bowel and sexual function symptoms, according to data from a follow-up of the SPCG-7/SFUO-3 trial. However, “relative to the benefit on overall survival, death from prostate cancer, and delayed PSA relapse, the increase of symptoms with the addition of radiotherapy seems small and has little effect on quality of life four years after treatment,” researchers wrote. READ MORE>
MODERN MEDICINE: TWO compounds – the diarylthiohydantoins RD162 and MDV3100 – are effective in treating advanced prostate cancer resistant to first-line treatments, according to research published online April 9 in Science. READ MORE>
US JOURNAL OF UROLOGY: CO-INCIDENT with the widespread adoption of PSA screening, the proportion of American men diagnosed with organ-confined, low risk prostate cancer has increased significantly over the last two decades. READ MORE>
PROSTATE EXPERT ON-LINE: Prostate cancers seldom produce symptoms until the cancer is in the advanced stage so early diagnosis is essential as in the early stages the disease is curable. READ MORE>
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF HEMOTOLOGY/ONCOLOGY: SINCE most men will survive their prostate cancer, the long-term side effects of treatment must be factored into medical decision making. READ MORE>
BLOG: PROSTATE CANCER MADE SIMPLE: PROTON surgery should be one of the first treatments considered for any form of cancer, claims the writer of this article called Prostrate Cancer – Made Simple (with a deliberate misspelling of “prostate”). READ MORE>
TIMES COLONIST, Vancouver: Identifying cancer early and nipping it in the bud is a good thing, right? Actually, prostate cancer might turn out to be an exception to this rule, says an article in Vancouver newspaper the Times Colonist. READ MORE>
EDMONTON SUN: AT LEAST 1410 men have to be screened by the PSA test, and an additional 48 men treated, to prevent one prostate cancer death, claims a report called Seven Things To Know About Prostate Cancer, written by a doctor for the health section of the Edmonton Sun newspaper. This means that a massive screening program would have only a modest effect on mortality and some men would get treatment and complications they didn’t need. So statistics can be misleading… READ MORE>
SCIENCE DAILY: A NEW multi-center study shows that an experimental drug lowers prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels – a marker for tumor growth – in men with advanced prostate cancer for whom traditional treatment options have failed. READ MORE>
REUTERS HEALTH: Men with prostate cancer who take part in a brief stress management program before undergoing surgery to remove their prostate feel better mentally before and after the operation, and report better physical functioning a full year after the surgery, a new study shows. READ MORE>
CANCER RESEARCH: A SIMPLE urine test may be all that’s needed to detect prostate cancer, if new findings in gene fusion research are validated. A newly discovered gene fusion is highly expressed in a subset of prostate cancers, according to a study by researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College in the US. READ MORE>
BOSTON GLOBE: IT could be a decade before a better test than the PSA is in widespread use. Read more by clicking HERE>
WALL STREET JOURNAL: TWO big studies in the New England Journal of Medicine just found that screening for PSA — prostate specific antigen — doesn’t save many lives. Should you keep checking it?…So begins a recent two-part series in the Wall Street Journal. Click HERE to read Part 1, and click HERE to read Part 2.
NEWS.HEALTH.COM: LATEST news on new prostate cancer treatment drug: news.health.com and efitness.com
WALL STREET JOURNAL, HEALTH: VIDEOS on prostate cancer treatment advances: cyber knife, cryosurgery; and 3-D biopsy.
CLICK on DETROIT: Doctors at St. John Macomb-Oakland Hospital in Warren, Michigan, are testing a new treatment that could cure prostate cancer in just two or three days.
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