HealthBeat

PSA Prostate Cancer Screening Questioned

PSA Worthless for Prostate Cancer Screening?

Inventor of PSA Cancer Test Says It's Overused.

Prostate disease and prostate cancer have been touted as a huge problem for men, and PSA (Prostatic Specific Antigen) tests, many resulting in biopsy, have been heralded as the "gold standard" of detection. Now one of the original researchers questions the use and importance of this test. Dr. Thomas A. Stamey, founding chairman of the Stanford University urology department, who led many of the studies that led to the wide acceptance of PSA screening, offers these facts:

Nearly all men eventually get prostate cancer. It's found in some 8% of men in their 20s and in 80% of men in their late 70s.
Relatively few men die of prostate cancer. In the U.S., Stamey says, there are 226 prostate-cancer deaths for every 100,000 men. So a man has only a 0.2% chance of dying from the disease.

Another noted researcher, Urologist Dr. H. Ballentine Carter, at the Johns Hopkins Brady Urological Institute in Baltimore adds that "By the time a man is 70, PSA testing no longer yields valuable information." This is because benign enlargement (non-cancer enlargement, the kind that happens to all of us guys as we age) of the prostate also elevates PSA levels.

So, is PSA testing and prostate cancer much ado about nothing? Well, as someone who owns one of these organs, I say definitely not! BPH (Benign Prostate Enlargement) is a condition that affects most men eventually, and can be miserable. As a Nurse who has seen and treated men in the emergency room whose prostates have enlarged to the point where they are unable to urinate, I am very clear on the suffering it can cause. Further, Prostate Cancer comes in two varieties - the usual slow-growing variety that almost no man dies from (unless you live to be 'way old, and survive everything else that men usually die from...), and a less common but very nasty fast-growing variety that can spread to other parts of the body. The latter form more often affects younger men.

So, do I get my PSA checked? Yes, I do, but I'm not obsessive about it. Equally as important is to have the dreaded "DRE" or Digital Rectal Examination, performed by a skilled physician. (I say "skilled" because some physicians do not have much experience with performing this exam and will miss a "finding." The DRE combined with PSA is more likely to be significant than a simple elevation of PSA level.

Well, you say, if I'm not going to be worrying about PSA levels so much, what can I do to safeguard my prostate health? Check out some of the suggestions on our Prostate Enlargement page - I do many of these things at age 48. I take Maxi Multi vitamins daily, I add Flax seed oil to my daily Super Shake, I eat low-carb as much as possible, I exercise daily, watch my weight, and I don't smoke. If I thought my PSA was rising I would add Saw Palmetto and Mega Soy to my daily supplements. I would also be sure to seek a doctor's help, though I would tend to avoid conventional urology which focuses on biopsy, surgery, and radiation, in favor of an alternative medicine consultation with someone like Dr. Myatt. In fact, Dr. Myatt is the one who oversees my male urological/urogenital care ;-). I'm happy to report that so far, I am in perfect health with no evidence of prostate enlargement or disease.

Let's face it guys, there are a lot of things out there that can kill us - prostate cancer is one of the least likely. It makes sense to keep yourself in the best health possible, get regular checkups, and don't sweat it - worry will raise your risks!

Cheers,
Nurse mark

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