Prostate cancer

Hi Psmike

I'm exactly the same thinking as you, I'm 56 and was worried about the side effects after surgery ,and my options was surgery or Hormone  & radiotherapy, my psa was 7.7 now 0.43 and I have a t3a diagnosis and  a gleeson of 4+3

Went for the hormone radiotherapy route as of now 14 weeks of hormone treatment no side effects as of yet hopefully starting radiotherapy with a empty bladder as I have a bad overactive bladder in May 

Good luck with your treatment 

Best wishes 

Peter 

Yes understood, what confused me though was, I asked how long had my cancer been growing and they didn’t know, so I then asked how far on is it then before it goes from 3+4 to 4+3 or leaves the prostate, the view was it could be years, so I then said well, how do you know it’s not at the end of those years and about to change score or wander outside my prostate, but again I couldn’t get this detail, so I decided it was about to wander or change to 4+3, so hence chose treatment, but it’s really tricky to understand, given only 2 years ago I was at psa 3.6…. Anyway, at least it got my brain back into learning mode. 

Hi Mike, yours posts are so similar to my scenario, I was 55 ( just turned 56) and my Gleason is 3+4=7 , T2aNOMO , latest PSA is 4.3, gone down from 4.8 in December

was diagnosed in March and main thing for me was I’m not having surgery for same reasons as you

my first thoughts were HIFU but doesn’t seem success rates are that great and I really don’t want to have to go through it all again

over the last week though am looking more into SABR as it does sound good option of just 5 treatments 

have to say though over the last month I am now giving surgery a second look but investigating best method I.e retzius sparing neuro safe with a high volume surgeon but I change my mind by the hour 

hope your appointment goes well 

cheers

Nick

Hi Nick I know it's very hard to make that decision but after doing research radiotherapy has come on leaps and bounds in last couple of years. Initially I wanted the cancer gone so was adamant surgery was the way to go but I just think for me personally I'm 100% radiotherapy, whether that's Brachtherapy or sbrt with me leaning towards the latter. They both seem to have less intrusion on your normal life also as I'm still in work. YouTube Sbrt as there's some good stuff on there saying how it's progressed and is at least comparable and probably more successful than surgery.

Good luck in your choice but I'll keep you posted as ill probably be starting treatment within the next month 

Cheers Mike , all the best 

I will probably try to see an Oncologist privately as it’s now 7 weeks since biopsy and 4 weeks since results, was told 4 weeks ago Oncologist appointment was running late and could be 4-6 weeks , now being told it could be July before appointment 

Hi Mike it would be good to talk, only just starting AS and already I feel the need to get into action mode and as Brian has stated it's not going to go away, just need to consider carefully each option available leaning more towards removal them it's done and hopefully young enough to recover

Colin

Hi Mike

Hope all goes ok tomorrow, will give you call sometime tomorrow to chat 

Cheers

Colin

Cheers Colin, feels weird but I'm actually in a good place, I'm a big believer in positive thinking but kkow it's not for everyone. Be good to talk... By the way what's your scores and how old are you?? 

I don't want to sound dismissive, what I mean is i, feel lucky as I've been diagnosed early and with anything early detection is key, how many of us men say ill be OK and put things off.. Well we can't, I had no signs or symptoms was just a simple blood test that highlighted my cancer, probably similar to a lot of you guys so spread the word, get a psa teat and hopefully we can save our brothers, ourates and maybe strangers we don't know. One person saved is a win