Scott has been graciously reporting on his experience undergoing chemotherapy in this blog. You can see his prior posts by searching by his name. On his last report he shared that he was going to take an unorthodox step, stopping his hormone blockade when on chemo. Normally, when chemotherapy is used to treat advanced prostate cancer, hormone therapy (ADT) is continued as a part of the treatment protocol. Scott explains that his rationalization for this decision was guided by the hope that the cancer would “wake up” to be treated. Scott shares the latest news about this strategy.

I wanted to give you a psa update before treatment #6. As you are aware I discontinued hormone therapy in January. The goal was to “wake up” the cancer cells and then kill them. My psa initially jumped from .27 to .89. It is now at .57. So it appears that our radical strategy is working. I could not be happier with my oncologist. He is a young man who communicates everything to me good or bad and then we talk about the overall treatment plan. At this stage of the game I want to be as aggressive as possible. The overall goal is to keep the psa below 10.0 that seems to be the magic number for spread of the disease. I feel good and as always continue to surround myself with loving family and great supportive friends.

Scott

Please note that Scott’s treatment decisions are not necessarily the best, but everyone of us should take an active role in our treatment decisions. We all know that everyone’s prostate cancer is different and will respond differently from the next man’s disease. Always consult your oncologist before making any treatment decisions.

I know that we all are excited to hear about Scott’s continuing progress and that we are all together in sharing the excitement in Scott’s declining psa number.

Joel T Nowak MA, MSW