Dudes, we need to…
April 9, 2024
It’s time for some man talk. Not locker-room chatter or Iron John junk, just what I hope will be plain language and common sense on the subject of prostate cancer. If you’re a man or you love one, please read on.
The disease has been in the news lately because of the death of Dexter Scott King, MLK’s son, and the controversy about how Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin failed to tell the White House he’d been hospitalized for treatment. According to the American Cancer Society, nearly 269,000 cases were diagnosed in 2022. The 2024 figure will include me.
I’m fine- more on that later. However, when I tried to learn about my situation, I found the landscape tough to navigate. The screening process comes with options, benefits, and risks. You can have an elevated PSA (prostate specific antigen) and no cancer, or it could be present even if the number stays low. A variety of treatments are available, sometimes including the choice of no treatment. There’s a ton of info to wade through and some complicated decisions to make.
After going through multiple levels of screening and receiving my diagnosis, the best piece of advice I can give my brethren is to find a doctor you can trust. And by this, boys, I do not, repeat NOT mean Dr. Google.
Let’s say your actual physician recommends you get screened or your PSA is a little high. So you search for “prostate cancer symptoms,” and get a page like this.
If you don’t have these symptoms — and especially if you’re squeamish about the whole thing — you might decide you’re in the clear. You could easily miss this sidebar: “Symptoms include difficulty with urination, but s ometimes there are no symptoms at all” (emphasis mine). In fact, a big majority of cases are diagnosed before these warning signs appear. That’s a good thing.
I didn’t have symptoms myself. I chose to be screened because I wanted to know what I was dealing with and not ignore a potential time bomb. As it turned out, my cancer is small, nonaggressive, and localized in the prostate. My urologist and I are monitoring it but I have no reason to worry for now and possibly forever.
I felt a lot better after reading this from the Prostate Cancer Foundation: “In the U.S., the 5-year survival rate for all men newly diagnosed with early-stage prostate cancer is greater than 99%.” The advice I wish I’d taken is not to freak out. Just be aware of the risk factors and think about screening as you get older. I’m glad I did.
Originally published at http://daveswanauthor.wordpress.com on April 10, 2024.
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