Is it just my imagination?

My urologist told me that PC is the #2 problem after lung cancer.

I'm one of them I guess, a bit longer than 90 days now though, I was really surprised by the number of early 50 year olds on here. I was feeling really hard done by at the tender age of 53 with this bloody disease until I came on here and saw younger people than myself and others with potentially worse case diagnosis.
I had been for numerous tests/scans as we do, just sitting in waiting rooms with other paitents who were all a hell of a lot older than me, and I'm thinking this is an old mans disease, what am I doing here? How wrong was I.
To be honest I don't what/how previous generations coped without the information flow that the internet has provided me with.

I agree about the "old man's disease", in the old days when urine flow became a problem....off to the doctor, never mind that it had been like that for 2-3 years before they told the doc, all of the jokes with the old timers, "prostate playing up........" now with the PSA test we are picking up on it a lot earlier (younger)
This is where I struggle with the opponents of OD, I had no symptoms other than PSA at 4.4, I would have carried on with life until a symptom did show up, and then, as we now know with G9 it would not have been a very nice outcome. I am going to advise my 2 sons to become pro active about this when they turn 40.

Yep, many younger guys are coming to HW. :-(
At my wife's company, they have had 6 (7 counting me) guys diagnosed with PC within the last two years, only one of them was older than 50!
It's a young guys disease sadly.

We'll always deal with the question of whether it's more prevalent now or we're just finding it more because we're looking for it.

I think we've all read the literature that talks about PCa being an incidental finding on autopsy at a percentage rate roughly equal to a man's age. ex: 50%/age 50, 60%/age 60, etc.

Through medical advances, men are living longer (think screening). Back in the old old old days, you were lucky if you made it to 40.

Purg,
It's not Just your Imagination but this is...

/www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNgcYKNoE3I

I always liked that one. The median age of HW three years ago when I compiled my own "study" was about 54yo. The median age at Dx was 67. With new parameters to screen we should continue to see a drop in the online age.

But also...

Many guys at 67 and above are on the other side of the digital divide. They are less likely to look for online support. I think as time moves on, and we are already seeing it, there will be more older members on our side of that divide. Until then the new screening "baseline at 40 or earlier" will continue to add computer savvy members in multitudes. I'm not 100% sure as yet how much change we'll see but it's going to be an increase in membership by nature.

Peace.

Tony

Purgatory said...
Doug,

Not disagreeing with your post or logic, but in the most simplistic of terms, if the cancer is there, then the cancer is there. Delaying, discouraging, or even denying screening - of course would greatly reduce the number of newly dx. PC cases (and I know you are not saying this), but the same amount of cancer would still be in the men not dx or screened.

david

I agree. I wasn't trying to imply that more discovery at an earlier age isn't significant. It is.

I am fully in the pro-screening camp. Give everybody a chance to figure out how to deal with it. If we can ramp up that dialog on a national level, it's a good thing, IMO.

Post Edited (halftrack) : 8/28/2013 10:07:41 AM (GMT-6)

halftrack said...
We'll always deal with the question of whether it's more prevalent now or we're just finding it more because we're looking for it.

I think we've all read the literature that talks about PCa being an incidental finding on autopsy at a percentage rate roughly equal to a man's age. ex: 50%/age 50, 60%/age 60, etc.

Although true that prostate cancer is present at autopsy at the rates you mention, it is also true that the great majority of those are histological cases and not clinical cases. That means that cancer cells are present but the disease has not fully developed into clinical stages of the disease. Most times the experts fail to mention that small detail.

RalphV

PeterDisAbelard. said...
Ralph,

Could you help me with the distinction? If those histological cells were seen in a biopsy sample would they not be reported as a positive result? I am in no way arguing -- just trying to wrap my head around a distinction you are making that I don't know about. What is it about the microscopic presentation of cancer cells that makes them represent a clinical, as opposed to merely histological case?

Hi Peter,
No argument. These are called histological, insignificant or latent cancers because they have not reached a clinical stage either in size or causing symptoms. These are cells that are abnormal and are one of the reasons that there is great opposition to testing with PSA. These are the low risk cases that are being claimed to be overdiagnosed and overtreated if found at biopsy.

These insignificant or latent cancers are small and of a less
aggressive type. Stamey et al. defined insignificant cancers as
being of low grade and of <0.5 cc in volume. The key is to understand that whenever present these may develop into full blown clinical cases in time but they still should not being considered as cases that most of the time can be detected by biopsy. These are typically indolent cancers.

For more information See:
ije.oxfordjournals.org/content/36/2/285.full.pdf+html

RalphV

Could be you are seeing more younger men on HW lately is because they are more computerized then a lot of the older folks?

Ralf,

That "small" point is an important point. Having some stray PC cells in say every man's body at a certain older age is not the same thing as having an active cancer in the body. Based on what you said, I think it takes the wind out of the sail on the other side of the great ODOT debate.

Keep up the great work.

David