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Author Topic: Prostate cancer risk slashed with new drug  (Read 1582 times)

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Offline capodetutticapi

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Prostate cancer risk slashed with new drug
« on: April 27, 2009, 07:51:33 PM »
Avodart lowered chances of diagnosis by 23 percent after four years of use

CHICAGO - A drug already sold for other prostate problems significantly cut the chances of prostate cancer being found in men with an increased risk of the disease, doctors reported Monday.

In a large international study, dutasteride, sold as Avodart, lowered the chances of a prostate cancer diagnosis by 23 percent after four years of use.

Tens of thousands of men each year face a problem like those in the study: worrisome results from prostate cancer screening tests and biopsies that come back negative.

There's no question that many had small tumors that were not detected, yet the drug still lowered the risk of cancer being found years later, said Dr. Gerald Andriole of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

He led the study in the United States and reported results Monday at an American Urological Association conference in Chicago. The study was sponsored by Avodart's maker, British-based GlaxoSmithKline PLC, and Andriole has consulted for the company.

Dutasteride now joins finasteride, sold as Merck & Co. Inc.'s Proscar and in generic form, as a potential prostate cancer prevention drug. In February, health experts recommended that men consider these medicines if they are regularly getting screened for the disease. Q&A


Both shrink the prostate and curb testosterone, a hormone that helps cancer grow, but dutasteride does this in two ways and more completely than finasteride. An earlier study found that finasteride lowered the risk of prostate cancer being found in men with no known increased risk of the disease.

The new study involved 8,200 men ages 50 to 75 with high PSA blood test scores but no sign of cancer on biopsy. They were given dutasteride or dummy pills and new biopsies two and four years later.

After two years, prostate cancer was found in 17 percent of men on dummy pills and 13 percent of those on the drug. After four years, it was found in another 12 percent of men on the placebo and 9 percent on dutasteride.

Rates of aggressive tumors were the same — about 7 percent in each group. That was a relief, because finasteride at first seemed to raise this risk. More study suggests that isn't the case — it's just that these tumors are easier to find in men taking the drug because it reduces prostate size.

Not all experts are convinced. These drugs shrink less aggressive tumors more than they do the most serious kind, and may be masking the problem, said Dr. William Catalona, a Northwestern University prostate cancer expert who invented the PSA blood test.

"If you give any hormone therapy, it will temporarily make things look good. I don't think we're preventing prostate cancer here," just delaying its eventual detection, Catalona said.

More time is needed to tell, said Dr. Otis Brawley, the American Cancer Society's chief medical officer and one of the scientists overseeing the dutasteride study.

"The only way you can figure out whether you have an aggressive tumor or not is to follow the guys and see what ultimately happens" in their death rates, Brawley said.

Some men experienced side effects from dutasteride, including trouble having an erection.


How many men will opt to take that drug or finasteride is unclear. The drugs cost about $3 a pill. To prevent a single additional case of cancer, 71 men would have to take finasteride for seven years, doctors previously calculated. A similar estimate for dutasteride is not available yet, Andriole said.

The advice in February that men consider these drugs has sparked more interest from the public, including one man who had two brothers with prostate cancer, said Dr. Lee Ponsky, prostate cancer chief at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland. Doctors started the man on finasteride.

At Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, "more doctors are talking about it with patients," said surgeon Dr. Robert Uzzo.

Prostate cancer is the most common non-skin cancer in American men. An estimated 186,000 new cases and 28,660 deaths from it occurred last year.

soon ah go b ah lean mean bulling machine.

Offline capodetutticapi

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Re: Prostate cancer risk slashed with new drug
« Reply #1 on: April 27, 2009, 07:53:00 PM »
ah go take viagara fuh de erection problem,but still good news fuh me seein this is wuh kill meh ole man.
soon ah go b ah lean mean bulling machine.

Offline asylumseeker

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Re: Prostate cancer risk slashed with new drug
« Reply #2 on: October 30, 2014, 07:45:27 AM »
Frequent sex may ward off prostate cancer

That’s the good news, but not any kind of frequent sex. According to a Montreal study made public Tuesday, sleeping with several women — more than 20, to be exact — has a protective factor.

It is associated with a 28-per-cent lower risk of one day being diagnosed with prostate cancer, according epidemiologist Marie-Élise Parent and her team of researchers at the Université de Montréal and INRS — Institut Armand-Frappier.

There are only “highly speculative” hypotheses at this point, said Parent, the lead researcher. One theory, supported by previous studies, suggests that men who ejaculate frequently are less likely to develop prostate cancer.

“A new partner over time keeps one active over the years,” Parent said. “So the presumption is that men with several partners were exposed to more ejaculations. That’s one explanation for our findings.

However, the Romeo, Lothario and Don Juans seeking a public health recommendation to have more sex to improve their health can forget that kind of seduction line right now. “We’re not there yet,” said Parent, a specialist in the field who is affectionately called Madam Prostate.

“And I would like to clarify that ‘sleeping with many women’ does not mean all at the same time. People must understand that it’s more than 20 women over a lifetime.”

The Montreal study PROTEUS (Prostate Cancer & Environment Study) questioned 3,208 men on various lifestyle factors, work and their sex lives. Of these men, 1,590 were found to have prostate cancer between September 2005 and August 2009, while the rest served as the control group.

The study published in Cancer Epidemiology, the International Journal of Cancer Epidemiology, Detection, and Prevention found that men who had slept with more than 20 women reduced their risk of developing all types of prostate cancer by 28 per cent.

They were also 19 per cent less likely to develop an aggressive form of the disease.

But that protection did not hold true for men who slept with men. Parent’s team found that having more than 20 male partners doubled the risk of prostate cancer compared to those who have never slept with a man. And their risk of getting a non-aggressive cancer was five times more likely. Sleeping with one man did not affect the risk.

On the other hand, virgins who had never experienced sex were almost twice as likely to have prostate cancer as those who did.

Researchers suggest that this is the first study to show that having many female sex partners, over a lifetime, provided significant protection against the disease, perhaps because frequent ejaculations reduce the concentration of cancer-causing substances in prostatic fluid and other structures associated with cancer.

But Parent could not explain why that does not apply to gay encounters. Perhaps because men who sleep with men engage in more risky sexual behaviour, or that anal intercourse may result in trauma to the prostate, but that’s only speculation, Parent said. More studies are needed.

The age of the first sexual encounter or the number of sexually transmitted infections had no bearing on the results.

Parent said her team was grateful to have participants who were willing to openly discuss their sex lives and preferences and, thanks to such frank discussions, it’s now possible to see that the frequency of partners affects disease development.

Parent’s study now has 4,000 men recruited and further analysis will look at the association between prostate cancer and such factors as stress, or night work and circumcision. Preliminary data suggests circumcision does offer some protection against the disease.

http://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/sex-with-21-women-lowers-risk-for-prostate-cancer-study

Offline Deeks

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Re: Prostate cancer risk slashed with new drug
« Reply #3 on: October 30, 2014, 08:13:15 AM »
So frequent ejaculation wears off prostate. uhhm. Allyuh wankers hear that!!!
« Last Edit: October 30, 2014, 02:27:45 PM by Deeks »

Offline Mr Fix-it

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Re: Prostate cancer risk slashed with new drug
« Reply #4 on: October 30, 2014, 02:17:09 PM »
I safe both ways then  ::) :P :P :P :P
"If the women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy

 

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