Prostate Cancer

A new study led by Fred Hutch researchers has found that black men with low-risk prostate cancer can practice active surveillance just like their white counterparts. Stock photo by Getty Images Black men diagnosed with early-stage prostate cancer can practice active surveillance just like their white counterparts instead of heading straight into surgery or radiation, a new study has determined. The finding, recently published in the Journal of Urology , comes from a large research collaboration known as the Canary Prostate Active Surveillance Study, or Canary PASS , led by Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. “I think this is good news for African American men,” said Dr. Daniel Lin , principal investigator of the Canary PASS cohort, the large patient registry that has fueled the decade-long prostate cancer initiative. Canary PASS funding was just extended for another five years. Read more here . “There have been some conflicting reports as to whether it’s safe to use a...

IMAGE:  Images were acquired 6 days after injection and are displayed at same gray scale with SUVmax of 10. Patients in upper panel (particularly patients 3 and 9) have extensive metastatic... view more  Credit: Jorge A. Carrasquillo, Bernard M. Fine, Neeta Pandit-Taskar, Steven M. Larson et al. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and Genentech Inc. A recently discovered prostate cancer-selective antigen has been identified as a useful molecular imaging target for the detection and targeting of metastatic prostate cancer lesions, as reported in the November issue of The Journal of Nuclear Medicine . Using a novel radiotracer, researchers were able to effectively image STEAP1 (six-transmembrane epithelial antigen of prostate-1) in tumors and localize a large number of lesions. Metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) is a significant health care problem, with more than 42,000 cases projected in 2020. "While significant strides have been made in detec...

Although one in nine men will receive a prostate cancer diagnosis in his lifetime, cutting-edge research has allowed more men to live longer or even be cured. Statistics show that one in nine men will receive a prostate cancer diagnosis during his lifetime, making it the most common cancer among men after skin cancer. But thanks to the work being done at institutions like City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center in California, more men are being cured each year, and those who aren’t cured are living longer. One such program that sheds light on this cause is City of Hope’s NoShaver November. The month-long fundraising and awareness campaign urges participants to forego shaving to start a conversation, encourage testing and raise critical funds to continue leading-edge prostate cancer research and promising new therapies conducted at City of Hope.  CURE ® recently spoke with Dr.  Tanya Dorff , a medical oncologist at City of Hope who specializes in prostate cancer, about the...

A number of biotech stocks have made major moves over the past week. One of those was Myovant Sciences ( NYSE:MYOV ) , a $1.1 billion biopharma company, which had its shares more than double on Nov. 19 following  impressive clinical trial results in treating early, androgen-sensitive prostate cancer. With hundreds of thousands of new prostate cancer patients diagnosed in the U.S. alone, there's plenty of potential for Myovant to hit a financial home run if its drug receives U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval. At the same time, this drug is well-positioned to become a leading treatment option for women with uterine fibroids. Let's take a more detailed look at the company's recent results and the strength of its flagship drug candidate. Image source: Getty Images. Understanding the prostate cancer market Prostate cancer is one of the leading causes of death in men, with around 174,000 patients in the U.S. diagnosed with the disease each year. While many drugs...

New knowledge is beginning to explain the decades-old question of why a treatment may work for one patient but not another. Cutting-edge technologies that allow clinicians to identify the mutations present in a patient’s tumor cells have resulted in the emerging field of precision medicine, or customized treatments based on the unique biology of an individual’s tumor. Precision medicine is an approach to disease treatment and prevention that takes into account individual variations in genes, immune function, environment, and lifestyle. Doctors now know that each patient doesn’t just have prostate cancer, they have their own particular form of prostate cancer. The hope is that someday, all treatment will start with genetic tests of the cancer, followed by custom treatments. Currently, there are multiple commercial tests that are approved by Medicare and select private insurance companies to better understand the aggressiveness of a tumor. Studies suggest that these tissue-based ge...

Psychosocial problems that adversely affect quality of life are common among men after receiving treatment for prostate cancer (PCa), and they need help managing depression, coping with fear of cancer recurrence, and dealing with other issues, according to investigators. Using data from a web-based support system that was part of a National Cancer Institute-funded 5-year study of 431 men with PCa, Erin K. Tagai, PhD, MPH, a postdoctoral fellow at Fox Chase Cancer Center/Temple University Health System in Philadelphia, and colleagues examined psychosocial concerns of men within 1 year of PCa treatment. They examined how confident men felt about maintaining their health and relationships with others and their satisfaction with how they communicate with their physicians. They also investigated practical concerns related to managing family, job, and financial responsibilities. Re-entry phase Dr Tagai’s team labeled the first year post-treatment as the re-entry phase because patients a...

Reports of new cancer treatments often raise high hopes and expectations, particularly, of course, among cancer patients and their families. But raising expectations is not something that Samer Ezziddin, Professor of Nuclear Medicine and Director of the Department of Nuclear Medicine at Saarland University Hospital is keen to do. 'In most cases, we cannot heal the patients who take part in our therapeutic programme. Our aim is to extend life expectancy by a number of months or even years, without impairing the patients' quality of life,' explains Ezziddin. And although over the course of his career he has seen patients whose cancer has regressed completely despite extremely poor prognoses, such cases remain the exception and should be regarded as 'statistical outliers' rather than miracle cures. The battle to treat the many different varieties of cancer continues to be very challenging, involving careful but laborious work, where progress is measured in small step...

Reports of new cancer treatments often raise high hopes and expectations, particularly, of course, among cancer patients and their families. But raising expectations is not something that Samer Ezziddin, Professor of Nuclear Medicine and Director of the Department of Nuclear Medicine at Saarland University Hospital is keen to do. 'In most cases, we cannot heal the patients who take part in our therapeutic programme. Our aim is to extend life expectancy by a number of months or even years, without impairing the patients' quality of life,' explains Ezziddin. And although over the course of his career he has seen patients whose cancer has regressed completely despite extremely poor prognoses, such cases remain the exception and should be regarded as 'statistical outliers' rather than miracle cures. The battle to treat the many different varieties of cancer continues to be very challenging, involving careful but laborious work, where progress is measured in small steps...

Western Oncology professor Glenn Bauman leads a multi-centre trial registry testing the use of a new imaging tracer for more precise detection and treatment of recurrent prostate cancer. Credit: Western News A new study looks to move doctors and patients closer to earlier and more precise detection of recurrent prostate cancer that would clarify treatment decisions and lead to more confident courses of action and better health outcomes. A multi-center trial registry testing the use of a new imaging tracer—prostate specific membrane antigen (PSMA) – is targeting men who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer , have had treatment, and are now concerned the cancer may have returned. "PSA (prostate specific antigen) is highly sensitive test at telling us if the cancer might be returning. But the challenge has been that the cancer is usually most treatable when levels are still quite low," explained Western Oncology professor Glenn Bauman. Standard PSA blood tests ofte...

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According to (inter-)national guidelines, (neo-)adjuvant and concurrent androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) in combination with external beam radiotherapy (EBRT) is optional for intermediate-risk prostate cancer (PCa) patients and is the recommended standard treatment for high-risk PCa patients. The aim of this study is to provide insight into the prescription of ADT in intermediate- and high-risk PCa patients treated with EBRT in the Netherlands, and to evaluate adherence to European Association of Urology guidelines and factors affecting prescription. All intermediate- and high-risk PCa patients between October 2015 and April 2016 were identified through the population-based Netherlands Cancer Registry. Variation in the prescription of ADT in patients with EBRT was evaluated. Multivariable multilevel logistic regression analyses were performed to determine the probability of ADT and to examine the role of patient-, tumour-, and hospital-related factors. Overall, 29% of patients wit...

[embedded content] Eric Shinohara, MD, MSCI, associate professor and interim chair, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, discusses the emergence of stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) to treat patients with prostate cancer. As the technology required for SBRT has become more affordable, the technique has become more widespread, explains Shinohara. Additionally, having the proper clinical and physics expertise to deliver the treatment is expanding. SBRT is now more commonly offered and, according to Shinohara, more data are needed to support this as a safe and effective treatment. Devices to protect normal tissues from radiation-related injury are also becoming more common. One such device is a hydrogel spacer, which is a compound that is injected between the prostate and the rectum to push the prostate away from the rectum, says Shinohara. By physically separating the rectum from the prostate, the radiation dose received by the rectum can be greatly reduced, decreasing or potent...

Reports of new cancer treatments often raise high hopes and expectations, particularly, of course, among cancer patients and their families. But raising expectations is not something that Samer Ezziddin, Professor of Nuclear Medicine and Director of the Department of Nuclear Medicine at Saarland University Hospital is keen to do. 'In most cases, we cannot heal the patients who take part in our therapeutic programme. Our aim is to extend life expectancy by a number of months or even years, without impairing the patients' quality of life,' explains Ezziddin. And although over the course of his career he has seen patients whose cancer has regressed completely despite extremely poor prognoses, such cases remain the exception and should be regarded as 'statistical outliers' rather than miracle cures. The battle to treat the many different varieties of cancer continues to be very challenging, involving careful but laborious work, where progress is measured in small step...

Professor Samer Ezziddin. Credit: Thorsten Mohr Prostate cancer accounts for 26 percent of male cancer cases diagnosed in Germany, making it the most common form of malignant tumor in men. If the cancer becomes metastatic, it is not unlikely that it will prove fatal in the generally elderly patients. Scientists and doctors at Saarland University Hospital recently conducted a clinical trial in which they established the effectiveness of a therapeutic method that is successful in controlling late-stage prostate tumors and their metastases without causing serious side effects. The novel element in their approach involves combining two radioactive substances that are able to destroy the tumor cells by very precisely irradiating them at very short (millimeter or micrometer) range. As a result, a patient's life expectancy can be extended without any substantial impairment in quality of life. The pilot study, which was led by nuclear radiologist Professor Samer Ezziddin, has been p...

Bryce Olson was only 44 years old when he was diagnosed with Stage 4 metastatic prostate cancer in 2014. An avid surfer, father of a young daughter, and a marketing executive at Intel, Olson got his diagnosis at an age when most men haven’t even been screened for the disease. “By the time I got checked out, I had developed one of the most aggressive cancers my doctors had ever seen,” Olson says. Globally, nearly 1.3 million men are diagnosed with prostate cancer each year, resulting in an estimated 360,000 deaths , typically in men in their mid-to-late 60s. While high-risk prostate cancer is often treated with surgery, radiation, or hormone therapy drugs , not all men respond to those treatments. The charity Movember helps participants create their own, local events to build awareness in their communities and raise money for men’s health projects. Courtesy of Movember “I went through surgery and six rounds of chemotherapy, but my cancer kept coming back,” Olson says. Although ...

Geriatric oncologist Supriya Gupta Mohile meets with patient Jim Mulcahy at Highland Hospital in Rochester, N.Y. "If I didn't do a geriatric assessment and just looked at a patient I wouldn't have the same information," she says. Mike Bradley for NPR hide caption toggle caption Mike Bradley for NPR Geriatric oncologist Supriya Gupta Mohile meets with patient Jim Mulcahy at Highland Hospital in Rochester, N.Y. "If I didn't do a geriatric assessment and just looked at a patient I wouldn't have the same information," she says. Mike Bradley for NPR When Lorraine Griggs' 86-year-old father was diagnosed with prostate cancer, he was treated with 35 rounds of radiation, though he had a long list of other serious medical issues, including diabetes, kidney disease and high blood pressure. The treatment left him frailer, Griggs recalls. A few years later, when his prostate cancer reoccurred, Griggs' father received a different kind ...