Low-risk prostate gets aggressive therapy

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J., July 29 (UPI) -- Most men treated for prostate cancer, even if their prostate-specific antigen level and cancer risk are low, receive aggressive treatment, U.S. researchers say.

Yu-Hsuan Shao of the Cancer Institute of New Jersey in New Brunswick and colleagues used data from 123,934 men with newly diagnosed prostate cancer from 2004 to 2006. Fourteen percent had PSA levels of 4 nanograms per milliliter or lower.

"The patients in these cases were less likely to have high-grade cancer, and more than half were classified as having low-risk cancer," the study authors say in a statement. "Despite their lower risk of having clinically significant disease, treatment rates for men with PSA values of 4 nanograms per milliliter or lower were comparable to those of men presenting with PSA values between 4 and 20 nanograms per milliliter."

The study, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, finds more than 70 percent of men with PSA values lower than 20 had their prostates removed via radical prostatectomy or had radiation therapy, 38 percent of men with PSA values between 4.1 and 10.0 and 24 percent of men with PSA values between 10.1 and 20.

"Radiation therapy was performed on 33 percent of men with PSA values of 4.0 nanograms per milliliter or lower, 40 percent of men with PSA values between 4.1 and 10 and 41.3 percent of men with PSA values between 10.1 and 20," the authors say.