Prostectomy Vs. Theraseeds ???

goods,

First off....Forget hormone therapy; save that for another day and time, depending upon whether you have a relapse following primary therapy. If someone had no adverse affects following three doses of Zoladex, he should consider himself VERY fortunate. With hormone therapy,ALL men lose interest in sex, which goes beyond impotancy and most men suffer hot flashes.

Secondly, alternative therapy is something that you can do and it may help BUT, at your age and with a GS of 6 and a psa of 6 (both favorable), you should strongly consider what your doctors are telling you and that is get rid of the prostate. Now, there are ways that that can be done which help to minimize the possible adverse affects. Da vinci surgery is prescise and I would highly consider it. See also if you may qualify for nerve sparing da vinci; although getting the nerves spared is not a guarantee that you will still be potent. Please be assured that even if you become impotant, there are ways to overcome it. BTW: all primary treatments have a high degree of impotancy. Its something we all learn to live with.

There is a lot of info on the web. I recommend that you read as much as possible, taking care that the info is not from 1999 (read as many recent things as possible).

 I wish you the best of luck.

 Joe 

Hey Goods..

The best info is to educate yourself.  Read and keep reading...Joe (badMama) is correct in telling you that.  You will find the right treatment for you.  I changed 3 times before I decided on Proton Beam Therapy at Loma Linda.  At least check it out, it might be for you.  Less invasive, fewer side effects...It took me awhile to figure out it is a different kind of radiation.  I was totally afraid of radiation and had not even considered it.

Good luck  with your search...oh.... and research the selenium supplements...there is some new research that says it may not be good for prostate cancer patients.

I was diagnosed with prostate cancer, 8.5 PSA and Geason 3+4

I have a friend who told me about ultrasound for prostate cancer. I feel very lucky to have been told about this as doctors won't tell you and so I want to tell others.   Although my G.P. told me that I was doing the right thing in pursuing HIFU. 

It costs $25,000. and worth every penny, it's called HIFU, for High Intensified Focused Ultrasound,  there are too many restrictions on the trials. HIFU has been in use in Europe for 18 years, and is in use in virtually every other developed country in the world, except the USA.

It's in clinical trials here in the USA, call 888-874-4384 to find a trail near you (it's free!).  But I left the country, I went to Mexico and had it done. It was pain free, I had no complications or side-effects from it, no recovery time. The hospital was perfect and the people very nice. My doctor is American, lives in S. Carolina and he has been traveling to Puerto Vallarta and Nassau once a week to treat men for 6 years.  He brings his own team, they all wore uniforms that said International HIFU on them. He brings a nurse, a anethisologist, and mechanic to monitor the machine. I had to get pre-op clearance from my G.P. at home, plus a complete blood panel. I sent him all my tests from the biopsy, etc. The procedure took 2 hours, then I had to wait for the sleeping potion to wear off, then the nurse drove me back to the hotel. I had a supra-pubic catheter in and had it removed after 12 days, it is in to prevent urethral strictures (a clog in the penis), to let the prostate pieces pass--they are little pieces of cooked prostate. 

I found a girl whose husband had it done 8 years ago, his PSA has been 0.1 for years, he's sent in several friends and they all report the same as me, it's amazing!   You will always have a gland, just no tissue in it, so the goal is low and stable PSA.

The latest trial from the UK still has 1 in 172 men with incontinence, those are my kinda results!  I've sent in a few friends and they all report no side effects.

When I think about ultrasound and radiation, I think they both are the same technology--they target the gland, only radiation did not have to go through clinical trials, and it has so many adverse side-effects. Ultrasound doesn't harm surrounding tissue as it is non-ionizing.

 good luck in whatever you chose!

Did you have a negative DRE? How many cores were positive out of how many samples? In a low core G6 with PSA under 10, Active survellience is the recommended treatment by both the Prostate Cancer Research Institute and PAACT.

For localized PC, expecially a G6 any local treatment has about the same cure rate. Seeds have the least side affects, followed by external radiation, then surgery.

How big was your prostate? Seeds are only effective in smaller prostates, under 60cc, maybe that's why the radiation doc recommended surgery?

JohnT

Dr Bob Liebowitz does this protocol with localized patients with good success ( better than local treatments according to his data). ADT3 for 13 months.

Information on CompassionateOncology.com.

Goods I really wish you well. but I found the trick with doing this is to do what I wish  my family  doctor first told me to do get in quick and get it out fast. before it gets a foot hold. With what he told me and with what you told us. I wish I dident have to say this but I think it may be to late. It up to you, but I feel . you left it for just to long. When I first seen my uro it was a year and a half after, I was first diagnosed, I had already seen two doctors in dererant states a few months after I had my biopsy both those uros refuse to do the robot surgery as I  at the time was 300lbs they just thought I was to over weight. I want to tell you what the next Uro told me. he said Ray your 57, your gleasion 8, and your PSA is 6, and it been a year and a half, since you were diagnose, I think it just to late, So Goods if you were diagnosed w/ prostate cancer over a year ago and w/ psa = 7 and gleason = 6. Age 56. and had and RP straight away I think you be OK, My uro doctor told me. that at this late stage, by now Ray you have a lot of tiny mini tumors travailing though out you body. Trying to get a foot hold, it been a year or so where they stop that were they grow. and doing any think after a year he found to late.  I ened up walking  a way from an RP, because of what he said, next  that he would have to take out all the lymph nodes coming from my prostrate, and take out any nerves around my prostrate, he then told me there are nerves going to both my inside legs muscles, these nerves come close to the lymph nodes coming from the prostrate during the operation he would take out the nodes and give them to a pathologist who would look at them strait away. if they have any cancer in them he would have to take the these nerves out too. because theey would have cancer in them I think this would have crippled me . so I walk a way from the RP.  he also said it did not mater if I had seeds or any other treatment the cancer is in my sysyem I think he was right you see three month after I had the biopsy a bone scan found I had the start of prostrate bone met's they told me I now had advanced prostate cancer I went to a naturopath who put me on a low carb diet so (no sugary foosds any more ) and a cause of liquid cellur Zeolitte, (15 drops 4 times a day for three months ) High dose vitamin C, and Zinc. A year later a bone scan found no prostrate bone cancer met's she also told me I must have just got it in time My psa went up to 13.8 it now about a psa of around 8 and its coming down because of all the holistic therapy I'm on I can tell you some awfull storys about hormone theripy but not right now there are other things you can do because your cancer is testoerone depenent the trick I found with treaiing my cancer it to make sure it stays that way the holistic I have about 129mg of red clover tablets a day the redclover mimicks testoseone and prostrate cancer is testoserone depentent because the isoflavones in the red clover mimicks testoserone taking it place on the cancer recetor blocking it so the cancer gets less testorone I found all so one way Im also0 trying to get pomegranate extract in Austaria how this works is because it an inhibition of NF-κB see this link http://doctorwascher.com/Archives/10-12-08.htm prostrate cancer is a sex- hormone depenent cancer it needs sex-hormones to servive when it be comes non- sex- hormone depenent it very hard to treat if you go to the link you will see pomegranate extract will stop prostate cancer from becoming hormone indepenant as it inhibits NF-κB. the other thing you will need to know is cancer needs carbs to live on so you shoud go onto a low carb diet

http://www.ehow.com/about_5230911_low-carb-diets-cancer.html

also this link to how cancer loves sugar

http://www.mnwelldir.org/docs/nutrition/sugar.htm

I will you well cheers Ray

johnt

My local urologist told me he doesn't recommend seeds or any form of radiation for men under 65, as it is too likely to cause another cancer in 10 years.

Your Urlogist is uniinformed. There is no evidence whatso ever that seeds cause cancer elsewhere. If there is have him provide it so all the professionals using this treatment can benefit.

This myth persists because in the 1950s when old external radiation technology was used did cause some other cancers later in life. There is no evidence that any modern radiation, either seeds or external radiation causes other cancers.

Urologoists know very little about PC, something I found out after 10 years of poor uninformed advice.

JohnT