Recently a friend shared with me his experience with prostate cancer. You have to understand that he is in his mid-fifties and is quite an athlete, not the stereotypical older man. This didn’t stop his PSA levels from creeping up this past year. Once diagnosed there are three treatment options: Surgery to remove the prostate, external beam radiation, or implanting radioactive pellets in the prostate.
(Did You Know? Here are six steps to reduce the risk of prostate cancer published recently in Men’s Health magazine.
1. Drink more coffee. It is unknown why and it doesn’t matter if it has caffeine in it. 2. Give your prostate gland a workout. A 2004 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association of over 29,000 men found that those who had 21 or more orgasms a month were 30% less likely to develop prostate cancer than those who had 4-7 per month. 3. Eat more tomato products since they contain lycopenes which reduce the risk of prostate cancer. 4. Exercise reduces the fatal forms of prostate cancer by 41 percent. 5. Eat more fish since omega-3 fatty acids reduce the risk of aggressive prostate cancer by 25 percent. 6. Reduce trans-fatty acid intake which may double the chances of developing prostate cancer.)
My friend chose the surgical treatment of robotic radical prostatectomy. Despite the unglamorous explanation of his post-operative course, he is doing well and resumes his exercising next week. Even with a diagnosis of “cure” and as all cancer survivors can attest to, he’ll have follow-up appointments the rest of his life. Prevention and early detection are the keys to beating not only prostate cancer but also many others.