Survival slightly higher at high-volume radiation treatment centers

Most readers will know by now that prostate cancer surgery results are significantly better at high-volume centers (see this link). Unsurprisingly, the same holds true for primary radiation treatment of high-risk patients. … READ MORE …

Exactly who is doing your radical prostatectomy for you?

According to a newly published article in Urologic Oncology, at least 85 percent of all radical prostatectomies in America are now performed using robot-assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy (RALP). Actually, this is hardly a surprise. However, … READ MORE …

Men in minorities or treated under Medicaid receive lower quality care

In yet another utterly unsurprising “research” finding, a new article in the Journal of Urology has shown that — in the USA — minority prostate cancer patients and prostate cancer patients treated under Medicaid are less likely to have their prostates removed at high-experience and high-volume hospitals where there is high use of robot-assisted surgical techniques. … READ MORE …

Hospital volume important to outcomes among older, sicker, Medicare patients treated by RP

A media release issued by Henry Ford Health System earlier today has a distinctly misleading headline that reads as follows: “Higher hospital volume more important than surgeon experience in outcome of prostate cancer surgery.” You need to read the content of the media release with care to understand that this headline is by no means an accurate summation of the results of the study referred. … READ MORE …

Annual volume of radical prostatectomies in US doubled between 2003 and 2009

In order to initially gain or maintain board certification, American urologists must (among other things) submit case logs to the American Board of Urology. A new study, published recently in the Journal of Urology, has used data from these case logs to assess current trends regarding the use of robot-assisted laparoscopic and open radical prostatectomy. … READ MORE …

Clinical and pathologic staging of localized prostate cancer: an update

A new review by Epstein, currently available on line in the Journal of Urology, provides a detailed analysis of the clinical significance of various factors in determining prognostic risk for newly diagnosed and recently treated patients with localized prostate cancer. … READ MORE …

Are clinical benefits of RALP being over-hyped to unsuspecting prostate cancer patients?

Back in March, a group of authors from three major medical centers published a report in the Journal for Healthcare Quality strongly suggesting that U.S. hospitals were inappropriately over-promoting the  use of robot-assisted surgery for treatment of prostate cancer. … READ MORE …

Prostate weight and risk for positive margins at surgery

A new study has clearly shown that men with lighter (and therefore smaller) prostates are at greater risk for positive surgical margins after robot-assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy (RALP) than men with heavier (and therefore larger) prostates. … READ MORE …

Prostate volume and risk for acute GU side effects after IMRT

There’s a new article in the radiation therapy literature suggesting a direct correlation between prostate volume and risk for severe, acute, genitourinary toxicity when prostate cancer patients with large-volume prostates are treated with intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT). … READ MORE …

Just how many RPs HAS your urologist done this year?

A new analysis of data from two independent databases suggests that (in the US) only 20 percent of urologic surgeons carried out 10 or more radical prostatectomies in 2005. … READ MORE …

Prostate cancer news reports: Friday, June 12, 2009

Todays news reports adddress:

  • Surgeon and hospital volume and outcomes to radical prostatectomy
  • Adverse events associated with the use of hypofractionated, dose-escalated, IMRT
  • Quality of sexual function after external beam radiation therapy
  • Percentage of positive biopsy cores and response to first-line hormone therapy … READ MORE …

The impact of NSAID use on PSA level and prostate cancer diagnosis

Over the years there have been several studies suggesting that regular use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory agents (NSAIDs) — the most common being aspirin — can decrease prostate inflammation and prostate cancer risk. Since aspirin and other NSAIDs are commonly used to prevent cardiovascular disease, it will be apparent that there is going to be relatively high use of these agents in the men who are also at some degree of risk for prostate cancer. … READ MORE …

Case volume and outcomes after brachytherapy

It has been well known for a while now that, as far as radical prostatectomy is concerned, surgeons with a high case volume tend to have better overall outcomes with a lower incidence of adverse effects than the average. A recent paper by Chen et al. has made an initial attempt to determine whether the same effects are evident with respect to brachytherapy. And the answer is not entirely positive — but there are limitations to this study. … READ MORE …

The prostate cancer news for Thursday, July 30

News items today are focused on information about:

  • a new way of approaching treatment of hormone-refractory disease
  • the initial clinical trials of a new drug candidate in hormone-refractory patients
  • the association between hospital and surgeon volume and patient outcomes after radical prostatectomy. … MORE …