PSA After Nearly 10 years

Hi Tony. We have some non-prostatic tissue that can produce a small amount of PSA in many men (the urethra, Cowper's glands, etc.). Also, some men have low but detectable PSA that stabilizes a bit higher, even higher than yours. Perhaps there is a tiny bit of unremoved, healthy prostate tissue that got or remained vascularized and, like Christopher Plummer, lives on.

Since your PSA has been essentially stable, I wouldn't worry. Had you been followed with a less sensitive test, you would forever be <0.1 and you none the wiser

BTW, if your actual PSA fluctuates at, say, about 0.034 or 0.035, you can see how a 2-decimal result could oscillate between 0.03 and 0.04.

Congrats on 10 years! Two cancers down, NONE to go! Well done!

One question. You say "perineum invasion" in your sig. Do you mean perineural invasion?

Djin

Congratulations on 10 years Tony! As the others said, all seems to be well with you.

Congrats on the excellent results!

I have a pesky G6 and am 13 years out from RRP in 2007... Also had SRT in 2010... Still a small rise to .20 - .30 where it has been stable for a couple of years... go figure... I am not worrying.

Your numbers look great!

pasayten

MG0351 said...
I'm not as smart as a lot of you guy's.
But I would think any PSA of .0 any number would be good......

That really depends. After RP, much depends on your path report and PSA. For some pT3 men, adjuvant therapy may be obviously required from the G score and adverse features. For others it may depend on persistent PSA in the months they are recovering from surgery. If, say, your 6-week PSA is 0.09, and your 3- month goes up, e.g., to 0.15, you'll want confirmation of a rising PSA, but probably planning for adjuvant therapy, even if it's just an advanced scan. And for others a rising PSA with more decimal places gives you more heads-up time to discuss BCR with your doc.

For other pT3 men, a low, but clearly rising PSA will mean drawing up an early or very early salvage-therapy plan and, perhaps, deciding on a PSA "trigger value" for when to begin.

On the other hand many G6 men with no adverse features are followed indefinitely with a standard test and live happily ever after with a string of <0.1, the kind of "undetectable" that doesn't tell you much about your actual PSA level because it isn't critical.
Djin

tony w - hey congrats

zero is better than anything but low and stable after 10 years is a VERY close second

after 10 years your odds keep on getting better, much much better

I would be very curious as to your year by year uPSA levels

I have a low measurable uPSA that is slowly rising, I hope it stalls as I am 4 years post RP

if you could add you uPSA history and story to this thread and the post below it might help others too

https://www.healingwell.com/community/default.aspx?f=35&p=1&m=4178134#m4178780