Urology Care

Published data from the Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial demonstrated that there is no PSA level below which the risk of having prostate cancer is zero. For an individual patient, the significance of a PSA level should be interpreted in a broad clinical context, including age, race, family history, digital rectal exam, prostate size, results of prior prostate biopsy, and use of 5α-reductase inhibitors. Considering the high incidence of asymptomatic cancer in the general population that may not pose an ultimate risk to the patient, the decision to recommend urological evaluation or prostate biopsy should be individualized after considering all these factors.

The risk that a patient will have prostate cancer detected if a biopsy is performed at various levels of PSA is listed in the table below:

PSA Relative risk for prostate cancer

PSA, Prostate Cancer

 ABC World News (3/10, story 8, 2:15, Gibson) reported, “There is an important new medical study…that offers the latest findings about prostate cancer. Researchers now estimate as many as 42 percent of prostate cancers are over-diagnosed, meaning men may show traces of cancer, but those traces will never harm them.  Still, because of aggressive screening and diagnosis, many of those men are getting treatments they don’t need.” Read more…

Prostate Cancer

A new study from the University of Souther California published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute suggests that men who take a daily folic acid supplement have an increased risk of developing prostate cancer, renewing skepticism about the value of supplements in the fight against cancer.  The study followed 643 men for slightly more than a decade who were taking either a placebo or 1mg of folic acid a day, which is more than twice the amount in the typcial multivitamin.  Participants taking the suppliment had 2.6 times the risk of developing prostate cancer than those given a placebo.

Diet/Nutrition, Prostate Cancer