The Three Legged Chair and other random thoughts

I was thinking about PCa and the potential of over treating and such.
given the latest news (USPSTF recommendations)

I've over analyzed my own experience and situation as many of us have.

I'm starting to think that surgeons are inclined to treat prostate cancers as aggressively as they do, because they can. kind of like a woodworker, who looks at a regular chair, with a wobbly leg, and says "with a little work , I can saw off the leg, and convert this chair to a 3 legged stool". The chair will still be functional, in most cases, except when the wood-worker makes a mistake, or just plain bad luck occurs. The chair owner is concerned, but he will still have a place to sit, so why not?

While in my situation, I've recovered physically pretty well (aside from that partial ED thing which is annoying). I'd like to think that my treatment was 100% necessary and that it saved my life, albeit my future life given the often slow progression of PCa.

How many would go for a PCa "cure", i.e. remove it, if there were a 100% guarantee of incontinence for life and ED ? it would save your life, but with certain and permanent side effects.

apologies if I offend people here with this question - just a random thought on a slow Saturday morning, no offense intended

No offense continued, we have a decent number of docs, in effect on commission sales within all this mix, too. That leads to total objectivity (lol), and surely telling patients to seek all opinions and choices and even non-choices which is the patients rights. Never any steering or scare tactics like the one Andrew got not long ago: 'if you don't take this zoladex shot you will die'....like that is a guarantee anyway...plus it is his right to decide his own choices and chose differently of which he did and with excellent results thus far. Docs shouldn't always have there way with you or a monopoly on anything.

If you knew for absolute fact of cure, perhaps many would say I would sign on for the 100% e.d. and incontinence or other wonders that are side effects. But, you don't know for certain in this game, it is an odds situation. It is what it is. Good provactive post, surely others can have other perspectives, alot depends on how you see it all , and your journey, your stats, your results. Results do vary, alot. 

Post Edited (zufus) : 10/22/2011 7:49:06 AM (GMT-6)

I was facing a very aggressive foe. I went into surgery knowing that there was a small chance of ED and incontinence. Statistics showed that guys with ED before were more likely to have it after. Since I was fine before, I knew I'd be fine after. Incontinence was the same way. I am in very good shape. Incontinence was for the overweight guys who are leaking already. I'll be fine.

At 2 years my PSA is <0.01 ! It appears that my PCa is gone and took all my erections with it.

When this whole mess started way back when, I believed I was going to be one of the lucky guys with no ED or incontinence issues. I had to. Otherwise my wife would not have been able to get me into the car to see the vet surgeon.
Jeff