Interesting. I wonder what they did with the AS guys if their PSA began rising quickly after the trial began? Did they offer them surgery at that point? They must have done something as I can't imagine them not being treated because they were in a trial. If they did offer them surgery, radiation, or hormones, that puts the findings in a different light as far as the value of treatment.
Whatever the treatment, this says that after a median of 10 years about
half had died but only about
3.5% of all of them had died of PC. I guess that says that either surgery or AS work about
as well for 10 years. That's encouraging for those of us in our 60s and 70s.
Another perspective is this. Any cancer kills because the cancer cells multiply to such a large number that they stop essential life functions. So it's
a matter of how many doublings take place from the initial cells. I've heard 40 is a rule of thumb so for the sake of argument say it's 40. That means you're probably not going to die after 35 or 36 or some number less than 40 but when you get to 38 or so there's not much time left. From this line of thinking I could understand how a study like this might not find much difference after 10 years but could suddenly find big differences after 13, 14, or some larger number of years.
Just my thoughts.
Post Edited (reachout) : 5/18/2011 1:27:02 PM (GMT-6)