Where Can I Find Support
It can be very difficult to deal with a diagnosis of advanced prostate cancer. Its natural to wonder if youre doing all you can to fight the cancer and how to handle guilt, intimacy with a partner, and concerns about masculinity. And finding and paying for the best care can, of course, be a challenge.
But emotional and practical support can help you move forward. An important thing to remember is that youre not alone. There are many kinds of help available, and the right cancer resources can make a world of difference.
Ask your doctor for resources you can contact, including social workers and support systems in your community. The Patient Navigator Program of the ACS can be reached at 1-800-227-2345 youll be connected to a patient navigator at a cancer treatment center who can help you with practical and emotional issues.
The Prostate Cancer Foundation has links to in-person and online support groups around the country, and the ACS lists nationwide support programs as well. The PCF also offers resources ranging from help with housing during cancer treatment to finding ways you can look good and feel better while living with cancer.
Fast Facts On Prostate Cancer Bone Metastasis
In a previous blog published on the GDO website, we discussed breast cancer bone metastasis, which occurs when breast cancer metastasizes in an area of bone. To accompany that blog, well now discuss prostate cancer bone metastasis, which is similar in many ways to its breast cancer counterpart but also differs in some significant aspects.
As always, this information is meant to be purely educational and is no substitute for tangible medical advice. If you or a loved one is suffering from prostate cancer and is concerned about the possibility of bone metastasis, consult your specialists immediately.
Cancercares Free Support Services And Programs
Receiving a diagnosis of metastatic prostate cancer can be very difficult, and adjusting to the necessary changes in your life can be challenging.
CancerCare can help. We are a national nonprofit organization providing free, professional services to anyone affected by cancer. Our licensed oncology social workers can provide support and education, help in navigating the complicated health care system, and provide information on support groups and other resources.
To learn more about how CancerCare helps, call us at 800-813-HOPE or visit www.cancercare.org.
You will likely also build your own personal support network, comprised of family and friends. In doing so, its best to take some time to think about the people in your life and how they are best suited to help. Match the task to their strengthsask a family member who loves to shop to pick up something for you at the store ask a friend whos a good listener to come over for a chat.
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How Does Prostate Cancer Kill You In The End
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer after skin cancer in men in the US and the second leading cause of cancer death. Prostate-specific antigen testing has made the detection of prostate cancer easier in its early stages. Ninety-two out of 100 men get diagnosed when the cancer is limited to the prostate.
Most men are diagnosed with prostate cancer in their senior years and only 1 out of 36 men die from it. Death from prostate cancer most often happens when cancer has spread to other organs in the body. This is known as the advanced stage of prostate cancer.
The chances of survival decrease as cancer spreads beyond the prostate. If cancer has metastasized to other parts of the body, only three out of 10 men will survive for five years after the diagnosis.
Advanced stage prostate cancer or metastasized prostate cancer
Cancerous cells may spread to organs other than the site of origin. In the case of prostate cancer, this tendency is decreased, but it can happen. Advanced stage prostate cancer is defined based on the Gleason score, which is based on the TNM staging of cancer. T stands for tumor size, N stands for lymph node involvement and M stands for metastasis.
Prostate cancer can kill in the end through metastases that can develop in
Metastasis to the liver can affect the livers ability to filter out toxins from the body. This can eventually lead to jaundice, nausea, loss of appetite and weight loss.
Side Effects Of Chemotherapy
The side effects of chemotherapy depend on the type and dose of drugs given and the length of time they are used, and can include:
Mouth sores are also a side effect of chemotherapy. Your doctor may recommend treatments such as:
- Coating agents. These medications coat the entire lining of your mouth, forming a film to protect the sores and minimize pain.
- Topical painkillers. These are medications that can be applied directly to your mouth sores.
- Over-the-counter treatments. These include rinsing with baking soda or salt water, or magic mouthwash, a term given to a solution used to treat mouth sores. Magic mouthwash usually contains at least three of these ingredients: an antibiotic, an antihistamine or local anesthetic, an antifungal, a corticosteroid, and/or an antacid.
Chemotherapy can cause changes in the way food and liquids taste, including causing an unpleasant metallic taste in the mouth. Many people find that switching to plastic utensils helps. It may also help to avoid eating or drinking anything that comes in a can, and to use enamel-coated pots and pans for food preparation.
Early detection of bone metastases can help determine the best treatment strategy. It can also help ward off complications. Because men with prostate cancer bone metastases often experience painful episodes, pain management and improving quality of life are important goals of treatment.
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What Is The Outlook
No cure is available for stage 4 prostate cancer. Your healthcare team will work with you to help control the cancer for as long as possible while maintaining a good quality of life.
Your outlook will depend on how fast the cancer is spreading and how well you respond to therapies.
With treatment, you can live for many years with metastatic prostate cancer.
What Happens If My Cancer Starts To Grow Again
Your first treatment may help keep your cancer under control. But over time, the cancer may change and it may start to grow again.
You will usually stay on your first type of hormone therapy, even if its not working so well. This is because it will still help to keep the amount of testosterone in your body low. But there are other treatments that you can have alongside your usual treatment, to help control the cancer and manage any symptoms. Other treatments include:
Which treatments are suitable for me?
Which treatments are suitable for you will depend on many things, including your general health, how your cancer responds to treatment, and which treatments youve already had. Talk to your doctor or nurse about your own situation, or speak to our Specialist Nurses.
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About Rare Prostate Cancers
Although prostate cancer is a common cancer in men, there are different types of prostate cancer, and some of these are rare. Because they are rare, we dont know as much about them. If you are diagnosed with one of the cancers mentioned here, speak to your doctor or nurse about what that means and what treatments are suitable for you.
Like most things in our body, the prostate is made up of different types of cells . The type of cancer that develops depends on the cell it starts in.
The most common type of prostate cancer starts in some of the cells that line the prostate, called glandular epithelial cells. There are two types of gland cells basal cells and luminal cells . Prostate cancer can develop in either of these cells.
When we talk about common prostate cancer here, we mean this type of prostate cancer. You may hear it called adenocarcinoma or acinar adenocarcinoma or see this written in your biopsy results .
Rarer types of cancer can also develop from gland cells, or from other types of cells in the prostate.
Some men have more than one type of prostate cancer. For example, they may have some common prostate cancer as well as a rare cancer.
Some of the rare cancers may be more aggressive than common prostate cancer. This means they may grow faster and are more likely to spread outside the prostate.
Metastases: Whether The Cancer Has Spread
The spread of cancer is measured in two ways: by lymph node involvement, and by its appearance in other organs or parts of the body, or metastasis.
Lymph node staging, or N-staging, determines whether the cancer is present in nearby lymph nodes. Lymph nodes are tiny organs that are part of the immune system.NX: The regional lymph nodes cannot be evaluated.N0: The cancer has not spread to lymph nodes in the immediate area.N1: The cancer has spread to lymph nodes in the pelvic region.
The M in the TNM system indicates whether the prostate cancer has spread to other parts of the body, such as the lungs or the bones. This is called distant metastasis.
MX: Metastasis cannot be evaluated.M0: The cancer has not metastasized beyond the immediate prostate region.M1: The cancer has metastasized deeper into the body.
- M1a: The cancer has spread to lymph nodes away from the groin area.
- M1b: The cancer has spread to the bones.
- M1c: The cancer has spread to another part of the body, with or without spread to the bones.
The combination of your full staging results, including your grade and your T, N, and M stages, paints a more complete picture of how the cancer is progressing. This enables your doctors to determine which treatments have the best chance or controlling or eradicating your cancer.
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Remission And The Chance Of Recurrence
A remission is when cancer cannot be detected in the body and there are no symptoms. This may also be called having no evidence of disease or NED.
A remission can be temporary or permanent. This uncertainty causes many people to worry that the cancer will come back. Although there are treatments to help prevent a recurrence, such as hormonal therapy and radiation therapy, it is important to talk with your doctor about the possibility of the cancer returning. There are tools your doctor can use, called nomograms, to estimate someones risk of recurrence. Understanding your risk of recurrence and the treatment options may help you feel more prepared if the cancer does return. Learn more about coping with the fear of recurrence.
In general, following surgery or radiation therapy, the PSA level in the blood usually drops. If the PSA level starts to rise again, it may be a sign that the cancer has come back. If the cancer returns after the original treatment, it is called recurrent cancer.
When this occurs, a new cycle of testing will begin again to learn as much as possible about the recurrence, including where the recurrence is located. The cancer may come back in the prostate , in the tissues or lymph nodes near the prostate , or in another part of the body, such as the bones, lungs, or liver . Sometimes the doctor cannot find a tumor even though the PSA level has increased. This is known as a PSA-only or biochemical recurrence.
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How Is Advanced Prostate Cancer Treated
The primary treatment of prostate cancer is prostatectomy, which is a surgery to remove a part of the prostate gland or the entire prostate gland in younger patients.
Androgen deprivation therapy is usually the choice of treatment of metastatic prostate cancer. Also known as hormone therapy, it is also used for treating patients who are unfit or unwilling to undergo surgery or/and radiation therapy.
Examples of hormone therapies for advanced prostate cancer include
- Abiraterone
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Bladder And Urinary Troubles
A prostate tumor that has grown significantly in size may start to press on your bladder and urethra. The urethra is the passage the carries urine from your bladder out of your body. If the tumor is pressing on your urethra, you might have trouble passing urine.
One of the common areas for prostate cancer to spread to is the bladder, because the two organs are close. This can cause additional problems with urination and bladder function.
Some symptoms your bladder and urethra are being affected by cancer include:
- urinating more frequently
- getting up in the middle of the night to pee
- having blood in your urine or semen
- feeling like you have to urinate often and not actually passing anything
Its not as common, but prostate cancer can also spread to your bowel. The cancer first spreads to the rectum, which is the part of your bowel closest to the prostate gland.
Symptoms of cancer thats spread to the bowels include:
- stomach pain
Faqs About Prostate Cancer That Has Spread To The Bones
Learn what this diagnosis means for your health and your future, and what you can do to feel strong and well supported.
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The prostate is a gland the size of a golf ball that sits below the bladder and in front of the rectum. Its responsible for making the fluid that forms semen. Many men develop cancer of the prostate gland its the second most common cancer among men in the United States. There are several stages of prostate cancer the earliest, when the cancer is still limited to the prostate gland itself, is the easiest to treat.
When the cancer has spread, or metastasized, beyond the prostate gland, its considered advanced, according to the American Cancer Society . When it spreads, its common for cancer cells to reach the bones first. Nine out of 10 men with advanced prostate cancer also have it in their bones.
At this advanced stage, the cancer cant be cured, says Scott T. Tagawa, MD, a medical oncologist at Weill Cornell Medicine and New York-Presbyterian Hospital in New York City. But with treatment, many men can live a long time. There are men Ive been treating for advanced prostate cancer for 10 or 20 years.
Arm yourself with the facts about what happens when prostate cancer spreads to the bones and what you can do to help manage it.
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What Is The Likelihood Of Prostate Cancer Spreading
Cancer behaves like a species competing for survival, similar to Darwinian evolution. More and more subclones of cancer emerge in the primary tumor. The more aggressive cells survive for a longer time and continue creating subclones.
Among these, the most aggressive continue surviving. This is how the disease progresses into a more dangerous stage in every step.
Thus, the question is not if cancer will spread but when. All cancers may ultimately spread, but since prostate cancer tends to progress very slowly, older men usually dont live through this process.
They may die for unrelated causes, especially if prostate cancer is diagnosed after age 70 years. Considering patients who die for unrelated reasons, extra-prostatic disease risk is very high .
Younger prostate cancer patients are more likely to live through the initial and intermediate stages. The younger you are at the moment of diagnosis, the more likely it is to experience metastasis. Youre giving cancer more time to reach that stage. It also depends on the genes involved in the process and your risk factors .
According to recent statistics, the incidence of metastatic prostate cancer is rising. The spread of this type of cancer is becoming more common with passing years to an alarming degree.
What Happens Without Treatment
Physicians will sometimes talk about a particular diseases natural history or typical progression if it is left untreated indefinitely.
With regard to prostate cancer, most cases of the disease are discovered while the cancer is still confined to the prostate itself. This is called local disease or localized disease.
The disease is easiest to treat while it is confined to the prostate. At this stage, surgery and radiation are most likely to be curative and completely kill or remove whatever cancer cells are present.
If left untreated, however, prostate cancer can proceed on a number of different paths.
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Experiments With Tissue Culture & Animal Models Of Prostate Cancer
Experiments with tissue culture and animal models of prostate cancer have revealed the mechanisms of the synthesis of lymphangiogenic growth factors in prostate cancer and their important contribution to lymphangiogenesis in prostate cancer lymph node metastasis.
Signaling pathways for VEGF-C synthesis in prostate cancer
Surgery And Advanced Prostate Cancer
An indication for immediate bilateral orchiectomy is spinal cord compression. Surgical intervention is mandatory for pathologic fractures involving weight-bearing bones.
In patients with clinical stage T3 prostate cancer at initial presentation, radical prostatectomy has not historically been considered beneficial, because of the increased probability of incomplete resection of the cancer, likelihood of micrometastatic disease, and increased morbidity.
However, a retrospective review of approximately 840 men with stage cT3 prostate cancer who underwent RP at the Mayo Clinic reported outcomes similar to those with organ-confined disease during the same period at this institution. Pathologic stage, Gleason grade, positive surgical margin, and nondiploid chromatin were found to be independently associated with increased progression of disease.
In another Mayo Clinic study, in which the long-term survival of patients with high-risk prostate cancer was compared after RP and after external beam radiation therapy , RP alone and EBRT plus ADT provided similar long-term cancer control. However, the risk of all-cause mortality was greater after EBRT plus ADT than after RP.
In the study, RP was used in 1238 men, EBRT plus ADT was used in 344 men, and 265 received EBRT alone. The 10-year cancer-specific survival rates in the study were 92% in patients treated with RP or EBRT plus ADT, and 88% in those receiving EBRT alone, with a median follow-up of 6-10 years.
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