A Prostate Test That's Not Fickle

Norbert, Did you know one in nine men in the US will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime? Yeah, it's actually the second leading cause of cancer death in men behind lung cancer.

But most men don't actually die from it because it's often a slow growing cancer. That's true, but the five year survival rate depends on what type you get and whether it has spread to distant sites. And in thirty percent of cases, they do.

To prevent that from happening, men have many treatment options that also carry significant risks of side effects such as erectile dysfunction and incontinence. A new treatment not only avoids those issues but appears effective in treating the cancer.

It's called TULSA which stands for magnetic resonance-guided transurethral ultrasound ablation. It maps the prostate to see the cancer using real-time MRI and a robot driven ultrasound through the penis and into the urethra. The urethra is a tube that carries semen and urine. Then TULSA uses ultrasound again to destroy cancerous tissue inside the prostate.

A temperature sensor is able to control the intensity and rotation rate of the ultrasound so that it spares nerves while clearing cancer cells. A five country study involving one hundred fifteen men found nearly all had over ninety percent of their prostate eliminated within just fifty minutes compared to hours-long operations.

One year after surgery, sixty percent of the men were cancer free. The prostate becomes unnecessary once a man no longer wants to have children, so one researcher says the magic pill would be to get rid of it entirely and avoid the many problems it causes.

Maybe one day, that will be an option.