Source: Annual Genitourinary Cancers Symposium; Medline
192,000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer annually. 27,000 cases are terminal. Currently under investigation is a new chemotherapy drug -Cabazitaxel which is being administered in conjunction with Mitoxantrone (a commonly used drug f0r prostate cancer). Men receiving this chemo cocktail (no pun intended) had a 30% increase in survival. To you or I 15.1 months to live vs. 12.7 may not seem like a lot but if you were dying and those were your options, wouldn’t you want more time? It is thought that giving the combination of drugs early in the diagnostic stage might translate to even greater survival times.
To that end researchers are developing better diagnostic tools for Prostate Cancer. Showing promise is the PCA3 urine test. Apparently overly expressed in men with prostate cancer, gene 3 is a fair predictor for advanced prostate disease. The current complaints against the standard PSA testing is the high rate of false positives resulting in biposy.
Finally, the tried and true cystoscopy procedure (Yes, the one where they insert a catheter with a small camera into the bladder. Over the river and through the woods…Well not quite. Cystoscopy has been found to be remarkable cost-effective. Accordingly, look for it to be featured more in insurance schemes and offered more by urologists. Cynical? Perhaps. But you’ll see.
~Posted by D.M. Schwadron, Esquire