Helathy+4SummerFall2023spreadsfinal - Flipbook - Page 12
Prostate Cancer
Treatment isn’t always the best solution
I
t’s only natural when handed a diagnosis of
cancer that your mind jumps to potential
treatment options. But, in the case of prostate
cancer, treatment isn’t always the next best move.
Practicing “Active Surveillance”
According to Matthew Vernon, MD, a radiation
oncologist at Southwestern Vermont Regional
Cancer Center, “Prostate cancer is really a spectrum
of diseases. Not every diagnosis warrants aggressive
treatment, or even any treatment at all.”
Here’s why:
According to Vernon, “The majority of prostate
cancers grow very slowly. By the time a cancer shows
up on a screening test, it’s likely a person has been
living with it for months, or even years with no
symptoms or ill-effects. And it’s likely they can live
many more years with it before symptoms develop
or it becomes necessary to treat it.”
When a person is diagnosed with prostate cancer,
the first thing their provider will want to determine
is how aggressively it is likely to grow and spread.
FAST FACTS
• One in eight American men
will be diagnosed with prostate
cancer during his lifetime.
• All men are at risk of
developing prostate cancer,
but that risk increases
significantly as men grow older
• The 5-year survival rate for
prostate cancer in the U.S. is
nearly 100%.
Source: ZeroCancer.org
10 | HEALTHY+ | SUMMER–FALL 2023
There are a number of risk factors she or he will
look at to quantify the level of risk involved, such
as the stage, the Gleason score (a measure of how
abnormal the cancer cells look microscopically on a
biopsy), and the level of prostate-specific antigen, or
PSA, in the blood. If it is deemed to be of low risk,
the best course may be to keep a careful watch on it
in the hope that treatment can be delayed or never
become necessary at all. Vernon explains, “This
strategy used to be called ‘watchful waiting’ until
the medical community actually campaigned to
change the term to ‘active surveillance.’ We did so to
emphasize that we aren’t just standing idly by and
doing nothing; we are actively monitoring for any
change in the circumstances, with every intention
of intervening if something in the overall situation
changes or looks more worrisome.”
If treatment’s needed, the choice is yours
In cases where treatment is deemed necessary,
most patients are offered one of two options:
surgery or radiation.
Vernon says, “Treatment recommendations are
always personalized to the individual patient, but,
for most patients, surgery and radiation are equally
effective options. Likewise, the risk of running into
side effects or complications for each treatment
approach is about the same, though the side effects
themselves are different. The decision of treatment
modality thus can be complex, based on which side
effect profile the patient finds more acceptable, the
convenience and logistics of each type of treatment,
and their personal preference.”
For a comparison of treatment options, including
benefits, risks, and potential side effects, see box on
the next page. +