New Findings Offer Fresh Hope To Men With Prostate Cancer That Has Returned After Attempted Cure

The link between the PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood test and the detection of prostate cancer is well-established. In new findings released publicly for the first time today, Australian and New Zealand researchers have demonstrated how two serial measures of PSA can be used to accurately predict a patient's prognosis when prostate cancer returns after attempted cure.

Survival can vary enormously among patients whose prostate cancer returns after curative treatments (such as surgery or radiotherapy). Some men can live for many years without the need for treatment however others will have very limited survival in spite of immediate intervention. Up to now, doctors have not been able to predict survival in these men and therefore have not been able to identify those who would benefit from participating in trials of new therapies. Nor have they known which men are able to avoid treatment for many years and therefore not risk the side effects that these treatments commonly cause.

Radiation oncologist and TROG (Trans-Tasman Radiation Oncology Group) researcher at Calvary Mater Newcastle, Professor Jim Denham and colleagues from Australia and New Zealand obtained the results by examining data from one of the world's largest prostate cancer clinical trials - TROG 96.01.

"PSA has been commonly used in clinical management of the disease but up until now, no one has been able to forecast accurately what will happen when cancer returns after curative treatment. Two factors - the time for PSA to rise after curative treatment and the speed at which the PSA is rising - are powerful prognostic tools for specialists and can now be used to plan future treatments on a sounds basis," Professor Denham said.