Modern Tests Can Tell You About Prostate Cancer Recurrence

One thing that makes cancer unique is there are few things, and especially few life and death things, that can be reduced to a single letter like cancer can be with the letter R. The fate of the cancer patient literally hangs in a space between two R’s where life itself depends on remission and recurrence.

Fortunately in the instance of prostate cancer, while it can be a very debilitating and even life threatening disease, advances in detection, treatments, and medications are proving successful in decreasing the instance and severity of prostate cancer which in turn extends the survival rates. And if there is any aspect of prostate cancer that could remotely be called good it would be that once prostate cancer has been successfully treated recurrence of the disease is relatively rare.

This does not change the fact that depending on the stage (how far the cancer has spread) and grade (how aggressive the cancer is) plus the patient’s age, ethnic background, family medical history, and physical condition all play a role in how successfully prostate cancer can be treated. The best strategy is to avoid the disease if possible and have annual checkups including prostate specific antigen (PSA ) tests and digital rectal exams (DRE) so if prostate cancer does manifest itself it will be detected in the earliest stages which offers the best odds by far for successfully treating the disease.

And as already stated if prostate cancer can be stopped recurrence is rare even in the five year post treatment period and recurrence is even far rarer once the patient has been cancer free for five years or more. Annual tests to detect prostate cancer regular doctor visits, screenings, and a positive proactive attitude are essential to taking every precaution to insure there is not a recurrence of the disease.

Advice aimed at reducing the risks of developing prostate cancer in the first place are also important for recovery and continued remission of the disease. Healthy diets, low in fat and high in fruits and vegetables, combined with regular exercise to prevent obesity, and following all doctor instructions increase the odds of staying healthy and remaining cancer free. But with a disease that has few symptoms in the early stages just having a healthy lifestyle is not enough to guarantee continued remission. And the only way of really knowing is to have annual doctor visits and tests.

There are also vaccinations available that will lower the odds of cancer recurrence. Some of those drugs are Luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone (LH-RH) agonists and gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists and anti-androgen treatments. These are hormone therapy drugs that are also part of the cancer fighting arsenal.

But still the only way both the doctor and the patient can be sure that there is no recurrence is to follow a regular schedule of doctor visits and testing. It must be remember that what is said about the advantages of early detection of prostate cancer are equally true for recurrence. There may be no real symptoms and by the time the classic symptoms associated with prostate cancer such as; trouble urinating, pain on ejaculation, and back aches present themselves there is a good possibility the cancer has spread beyond the prostate

Obviously once the cancer has spread from the prostate to other parts of the body including bone and lymph nodes it is much harder to treat, there are fewer treatment options available, and the odds of successful treatment and total remission dwindle. Prostate cancer, however, even in cases of recurrence don’t necessarily mean a death sentence but that is one distinct possibility, and a possibility that many times can be avoided with a healthy and active lifestyle and regular doctor visits especially for men over 50.

Related Articles

• Not All Kinds of Prostate Tumors Are Cancerous
• Diagnosis
• Metastasis Prostate Cancer
• PSA & DRE Screening
• My Boyfriend Is Just 40 Years Old And He Has Prostate Cancer And It Has Spread To His Bones; Could This Be Hereditary?
• 10 Things That Can Affect a PSA Test
• 10 Tests Used in Diagnosing Prostate Cancer