Re: Delayed Treatments for Prostate Cancer


"George Conklin" <georgeconklin1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:O1YEg.8925$xp2.8279@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Skeptic" <bcs002b@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:2fQEg.904055$084.859533@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Are you talking about,
"Incidence of Initial Local Therapy Among Men With Lower-Risk Prostate
Cancer in the United States " ?

All that that article finds is that we are overtreating some men with low
grade prostate cancer - something which we all know already. But until
we
have a way to find out which men will die of prostate cancer and which
ones
will die of something else, overtreating is far better than not treating.

That must be the article you're talking about, since it's the only one
from
August that discusses this issue. That study is just another (of many
many
many) that is data mining from the SEER database. Their paper has
surprisingly little data in it. It just points out that we, as a
country,
are probably treating some men - particularly younger men with low risk
disease. Of course, younger guys are also the perfect age group to treat
surgically since a 55 year old man has almost 30 years left of life
expenctancy - and if the prostate is left to grow, it may well end up
killing him.

The authors even admit they have, essentially, nothing of substance.
They
state, "Given the substantial body of evidence supporting expectant
management as an evidence based option for the initial treatment of men
with
lower risk prostate cancers, our data highlight the need to better define
potential catalysts and barriers to the use of initial expectant
management
among CAREFULLY SELECTED PATIENTS [emphasis added] with new diagnosed
prostate cancer"

Uh huh... riiiight. There should have been an editorial reply of "no
***
Sherlock". And just how does one "carefully select" these patients? Ah,
why with a crystal ball of course. "You, Mr. S, will die of a heart
attack
in 9 years so no need to deal with your low risk prostate cancer right
now.
But you, Mr. L, will live a long and healthy life if we operate on your
prostate before it goes metastatic".

Sigh. There's nothing new in this article. Nothing.


You always confuse science with policy.

Wow, awesome response.


.