Yesterday’s post was about the use of chemotherapy (with docetaxel) for the treatment of men with advanced prostate cancer who were 80 years old or older. Today’s post is about the use of chemotherapy in men 60 years or younger. The research for both of these posts was performed by the same team of scientists [...]
Chemotherapy (chemo with docetaxel) has a reputation for being a difficult therapy loaded with many side effects. I believe that this reputation is overblown given that all of our new non-chemotherapies (other than Provenge) come with their own list of significant side effects. However, its reputation is in the minds of many, so men who [...]
In yesterday's post I wrote about the possibility of looking for the presence of the splice variant ARV7 to determine if you would be resistant to enzalutamide (Xtandi). Today I am going to expand on this issue and discuss an additional study that demonstrated that the presence of ARV7 in circulating tumor cells not only [...]
I have written a lot about how we need more data about the many new drugs we have to treat men with advanced prostate cancer. The many questions that continue to swirl around us pertain to the development of cross resistance (taking one drug causes another to not work) between these new drugs, knowing the [...]
Over the past two to three years there have been some small studies that have indicated that the use of concomitant anticoagulants along with docetaxel (chemotherapy) may improve overall survival The most recent examination of this issue was performed by a team led by Emmanuel S. Antonarakis, MD, of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. They [...]
Please take the ten minute anonymous survey about Life With Prostate Cancer. Go to: How We Live With Prostate Cancer Survey The direct link to the survey is: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/livingwithprostatecancer The results will be used to let doctors and caregivers know the reality of our lives after treatment, as well as to understand survivorship differences between [...]
Abiraterone Acetate (Zytiga) and enzalutamide (Xtandi) are the newest generation hormonal agents. They both have demonstrated a survival advantage in men with castrate resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) who have already been treated with docetaxel (chemotherapy). Unfortunately all men who are responsive to both of these drugs eventually become resistant. Some men are subject to early [...]
Sometimes some of us just simply decide that we will not start any treatment or continue a treatment protocol simply because we don’t want to have treatment. This type of decision is different from our deciding that a specific treatment has too many side effects for the potential upside it might provide. Researchers set out [...]
Chemotherapy using docetaxel remains an important therapy, despite the newly approved drugs, to treat hormone refractory prostate cancer. Chemotherapy improves survival, however, all men taking it will eventually become refractory to the treatment. Zoledronic acid (ZA) is the most potent member of nitrogen-containing bisphosphonate family and has anti-tumor activity in prostate cancer. In a study, [...]
Popular culture tells us that primary androgen deprivation therapy with leuprorelin acetate (Lupron) will not work for longer than two years! This is a significant and very problematic statement given that all of us with metastatic prostate cancer rely on delaying the move to any other treatments, especially given their cost to the quality of [...]
