I have talked a lot about our need to take the next step in clinical care, understanding the best sequencing of our drugs. Since we have a number of new drugs to treat advanced prostate cancer we now need to better understand which drugs should be used in which men as well as their proper [...]
Can exercise improve the quality of life of men with advanced prostate cancer and also extend their survival? To help answer this question a major new global trial known as GAP4 has been launched in Dublin, Ireland. The trial has a goal of recruiting 866 men from seven countries, including Ireland. The trial will be [...]
New information about a possible bad side effect of hormone therapy (ADT) for men with prostate cancer was just published and it is frightening for men on hormone therapy (ADT). The findings are a result of a joint study conducted by researchers at Penn University Medicine with researchers from Stanford University. What is it that [...]
I have often had men recently diagnosed with advanced, metastatic prostate cancer call me and ask if surgery makes any sense for them to consider. I have never been sure how to respond given that their cancer is known to be already out of their gland. In response to this common question, researchers from the [...]
Cancer is a genetic disease, so prostate cancer is a genetic problem. This statement might be the most important one we can make when trying to describe the current, overall situation we face as prostate cancer survivors! Many institutions have begun significant research studies trying to understand the actual genetic keys to prostate cancer. Prostate [...]
Understanding a little about the prostate gland and its biology is not only interesting, but it allows us to ask some important questions that can positively inform our treatment decisions and eventually the outcomes. On the other hand, it also can add to the confusion we all face in making the best clinical decisions. Like [...]
Clinical trials have shown that there is an overall survival and radiographic progression-free survival benefit derived from abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) in the treatment of men with metastatic castration resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC). A new retrospective study published online, ahead of print, shows this trend is true regardless of a man's Gleason score at diagnosis, despite [...]
Knowing the negative prognostic factors for successful treatment when you have a a biochemical recurrence (PSA only) of your prostate cancer is important. These factors can help you make your treatment decisions because they assist you in evaluating your possible clinical outcome. In a single institutional review of negative prognostic outcomes of salvage radiotherapy in [...]
Once a clinical trial has been completed, especially when the trial is positive, researchers will “data mine” the published information. The published results provide additional opportunities to evaluate the data in different ways than the trial was originally designed. This new data can be very interesting and informative, however it also needs to be considered [...]
Researchers are now beginning to understand which men with castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) might be helped by radium-223 (Xofigo), and for which men Xofigo will be a waste of time and money, and possibly cause harm. They have found that baseline ECOG performance status, alkaline phosphatase (ALP), hemoglobin (Hb) levels, and the concomitant use of abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) [...]
