Sunday, July 4, 2010

The Top Ten Prostate Cancer Myths

  • Myth #1 – Prostate cancer1 is common, but few men actually die from it. In fact, prostate cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death among men in the United States and claims almost 30,000 lives in the United States each year.
  • Myth #2 – Prostate cancer is only found in elderly men. While it is true that prostate cancer is more common with increasing age2, it can be found in men of all ages. Prostate cancer is increasingly being diagnosed in men in their forties and fifties.
  • Myth #3 – If you don’t have any symptoms, then you don’t have prostate cancer. Today, because of the widespread use of the PSA test3 for prostate cancer screening, most men are actually diagnosed4 with prostate cancer before they have had any symptoms. Urinary symptoms5 like hesitancy, frequency, or dribbling are important and could mean a problem with your prostate. However, not having these symptoms does not rule out prostate cancer.
Please read on:

Proton beam therapy has been used for over 50 years

Well I could not hold myself back on what seems an endless rhetoric of comments on proton therapy posted through the various groups on the internet. They usually go like this:

"Has anyone undergone this treatment as their primary form of treatment and are dissatisfied with the results?? The cancer forums are full of glowing testimonials claiming full cures with no side effects but I suspect there is a dark side to this procedure that goes unreported..I notice no one talks about the cost and the hassle of relocating to one of the few treatment centers for 8 or 10 weeks...

Does proton beam really enjoy a higher success rate than standard external beam radiation??
"...as it goes

My reply to this reads like this.....

Loma Linda Medical University has treated over 10,000 prostate patients since the early 90's. You will be hard pressed to find a dark side to proton therapy vs other forms of treatment available. With the treatment being offered for pediatric cancers, brain, eye, lung early stage cancers the proton beam is a powerful instrument of cure. If you are looking at justifying cost with an means that cures children and so many types of cancer with no long term side effects...why would you ask this question? How do you put a value on saving a childs life or reducing the pain suffering from lung cancer. Proton beam therapy has been with us since the early 50's (referencing "Handbook of accelerator physics and engineering" By Alex Chao) it states.."page 30 "Even with less sophisticated delivery systems, dose distributions of proton and ion beams are considerably better then even the best x-ray systems, and successful clinical programs with these beams have been ongoing for almost 50 years."

For those that are under-insured and uninsured (no insurance) or need financing, there are many options for proton treatment within reasonable costs (please contact me if you need help). Yes I have battled cancer and was treated with Proton with 45 sessions. I have no side effects and doing just great. To me the small inconvenience of being away from home for 9 weeks was far better than what other forms of treatment side effects offered. If you have been diagnosed with cancer and proton beam therapy is an option please take a look it. It will be a wise decision.

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