Do most men have advanced-stage prostate cancer at diagnosis?
Men can certainly be diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer at an initial evaluation, but that's becoming more rare with the widespread use of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing. This test uses a blood sample to measure the amount of PSA, a protein made by the prostate. The more PSA present, the higher the likelihood of a patient having prostate cancer. If this test indicates that cancer might be present, a biopsy will be done to confirm the diagnosis.
The vast majority of men diagnosed with prostate cancer have what doctors believe to be clinically localized cancer. That means those patients are treated with either surgery or radiation because the cancer has remained mostly localized to the prostate.
If you look at patients who have been treated with surgery or radiation, about 25 to 30 percent have a cancer recurrence. Not all of those men go on to have symptoms from the disease, but many men end up being treated for the cancer that has come back after initial therapy.
What is the goal for treating advanced-stage prostate cancer?
The goal of cancer therapy, in general, is to try to cure the cancer. If a cure is not possible, then prolonging a person’s life and equally, if not more importantly, maintaining quality of life becomes the goal. With advanced stage disease, many men have problems with cancer in their bones, which can lead to a significant amount of pain, and, in some instances, fractures. So the goals of therapy are to try to prevent or delay the progression of the disease and to reduce symptoms from the disease in the bones.
