Fretting over a zero PSA

When I got my latest PSA results Friday, at first I was worried my PSA was up compared to my last reading. Three months ago the reading was 0.01. This time I used a different lab and the reading was <0.1. My Uro said both readings are the same and both mean zero. He actually was a bit animated talking about labs that stretch out readings to the hundredths. He wished all labs gave readings to the tenth only saying too many people stress out when they see those readings in the hundredths go up and that anything below .1 is a zero. I wanted to share his thoughts with everyone because I have actually read stories where some of you have contemplated treatment or maybe even had treatment because you had a rising PSA but it was still in the hundredths and if I am not mistaken I think some of you said your Uro or RO even agreed that treatment was in order even though the PSA was still below .1. So it really makes me curious why anyone would contemplate any treatment with a PSA that is technically zero. And I would love to hear from some of you on my Uro's line of thinking.

142 for two years I have been using the same lab, but when the hospital lab I have been using told me I could save $90 out of my pocket using an outside lab....well, I chose to save $90.

Congratulation!!!

Party time!!!

Great number!!!

Keep them zeros coming,
Andrew

The more decimal places you use to carry out a measurement the more times you will see a variation in those numbers. No measurement process can repeat or reproduce the exact same measurement all the time even on the same sample being tested. For example, if you measured a PSA at 0.003 one time the next check on the same sample might show up as 0.002 or 0.004 when checked again on the same sample. If you round off those 0.002 to 0.004 measurements to the nearest 2 place decimal, you still have 0.00. If 0.005 shows up then you could round that off to 0.01 which still is only 10% of 0.1. Don't sweat individual variation in those 3 place decimal numbers. What to look out for is an upward trend in a series measurements.

I strongly agree with your doctor's view. Ultra sensitive testing generally only encourages needless worry to those with the mind set to worry. Wish they wouldn't use it, in most cases.