Twenty years of screening for breast and prostate cancer – the most diagnosed cancer for women and men – have not brought the anticipated decline in deaths from these diseases, argue experts from the University of California, San Francisco and the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio in an opinion piece published in the "Journal of the American Medical Association."

New research indicates that the use of minimally invasive procedures (including the use of robotic assistance) for radical prostatectomy, which have increased significantly in recent years, may shorten hospital stays and decrease respiratory and surgical complications, but may also result in an increased rate of certain complications, including incontinence and erectile dysfunction, according to a study in the October 14 issue of JAMA, a theme issue on surgical care.

HOUSTON -- (June 9, 2009) – As stroma – the supportive framework of the prostate gland – react to prostate cancer, changes in the expression of genes occur that induce the formation of new structures such as blood vessels, nerves and parts of nerves, said researchers at Baylor College of Medicine in a report that appears in the current issue of the journal Clinical Cancer Research.

A new review published in the Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics assessed whether certain modifications in diet have a beneficial effect on the prevention of prostate cancer. Results suggest that a diet low in fat and red meat and high in fruits and vegetables is beneficial in preventing and treating prostate cancer.

Robert W.-L. Ma and K. Chapman conducted an evidence-based review of dietary recommendations in the prevention of prostate cancer as well as in the management of patients with prostate cancer.

DURHAM, N.C. -- Popular cholesterol-busting drugs -- statins -- appear to lower men's PSA values along with their cholesterol levels, according to researchers in the Duke Prostate Center and the Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center. But whether the drugs prevent prostate cancer growth or just mask it is not known yet.

"Previous studies had shown that men taking statins were less likely to develop advanced forms of prostate cancer but no one had looked at the relationship between the drugs and prostate-specific antigen, or PSA, a biomarker that is correlated with cancer growth and is the most common prostate cancer screening tool," said Stephen Freedland, M.D., a urologist at Duke and senior investigator on the study. "Our study represents a move to understand if and how statins influence prostate biology and whether they are really reducing cancer risk, or simply making PSA a less effective screening tool."

Geneva, Switzerland: Analysis of data from several phase I and II clinical trials of a new cancer vaccine has shown it is capable of eliciting an immune response in most patients with bowel, kidney and prostate cancer, and that it may provide clinical benefit.

In a news briefing at the 20th EORTC-NCI-AACR [1] Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics in Geneva yesterday (Thursday 23 October), Dr Richard Harrop, vice-president of clinical immunology at Oxford BioMedica, a UK-based biotechnology company – said: "Our exploratory analyses of data from nine different trials of TroVax® demonstrate significant associations between immune responses and overall survival in patients with colorectal cancer, renal cancer and prostate cancer.

Common painkillers like aspirin and ibuprofen appear to lower a man's PSA level, the blood biomarker widely used by physicians to help gauge whether a man is at risk of prostate cancer.

But the authors of the study, which appears online Sept. 8 in the journal Cancer, caution that men shouldn't take the painkillers in an effort to prevent prostate cancer just yet.

"We showed that men who regularly took certain medications like aspirin and other non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, or NSAIDS, had a lower serum PSA level," said first author Eric A. Singer, M.D., M.A., a urology resident at the University of Rochester Medical Center. "But there's not enough data to say that men who took the medications were less likely to get prostate cancer. This was a limited study, and we do not know how many of those men actually got prostate cancer."

Some of the drugs given to many men during their fight against prostate cancer can actually spur some cancer cells to grow, researchers have found. The findings were published online this week in a pair of papers in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The results may help explain a phenomenon that has bedeviled patients for decades. Hormone therapy, a common treatment for men with advanced prostate cancer, generally keeps the cancer at bay for a year or two. But then, for reasons scientists have never understood, the treatment fails in patients whose disease has spread – the cancer begins to grow again, at a time when patients have few treatment options left.

Each year nearly 33,000 men in the UK are diagnosed with prostate cancer and more than 10,000 die from the disease. It has become the most common cancer in men and mainly affects men over the age of 50. People affected and their families should be informed about all the options available to them - cryotherapyterm is one such treatment option.

Cryotherapy is based on the science of freezing at very cold temperatures to kill cancerous cells. This minimally invasive, non-surgical and non-radiation treatment freezes and destroys tumours. The treatment is performed by inserting very fine sealed needles directly into the tumours, through which Argon gas is circulated to reach sub-zero temperatures.

DURHAM, N.C. -- Testing men for elevated levels of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) in the blood -- the gold standard screening test for prostate cancer -- may be biased against obese men, whose PSA levels tend to be deceptively low. And this bias may be creating more aggressive cancers in this population by delaying diagnosis, according to a new study led by investigators in the Duke Prostate Center and the Durham Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center.

"We know that obese men tend to have lower PSA values than their normal-weight counterparts, possibly caused by larger blood volumes which dilute the readings," said Stephen Freedland, M.D., a urologist at Duke and the Durham VA, and lead investigator on this study. "Now we know some of the real implications of this -- that these men are at a disadvantage in terms of prognosis compared to normal-weight men."

(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — UC Davis Cancer Center physicians today released results of research showing that Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange have greatly increased risks of prostate cancer and even greater risks of getting the most aggressive form of the disease as compared to those who were not exposed.

The findings, which appear online now and will be published in the September 15 issue of the journal Cancer, are the first to reliably link the herbicide with this form of cancer by studying a large population of men in their 60s and the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test to screen for the disease.

Researchers at the University of Adelaide have developed a novel approach to treating advanced prostate cancer that could be more effective with fewer side effectsterm.

Professor Wayne Tilley and Dr Lisa Butler of the University's Dame Roma Mitchell Cancer Research Laboratories have discovered that by using existing prostate cancer drugs in combination with new drugs at lower doses, they can expect to generate better results for patients than current treatments.

Growth of prostate cancer is initially dependent on hormones called androgens, which traditionally have been suppressed to stop tumour growth. However, despite an initial response, resistance to hormone deprivation often occurs and the tumour starts to grow again, Professor Tilley says.

NEW YORK (July 30, 2008) -- Robotic surgery, largely pioneered for prostate cancer surgery, is rapidly being adapted for use in other areas, including for bladder cancer patients. Urologic surgeons at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center now have significant experience -- and have demonstrated considerable success -- with robotics for removal of the bladder, also known as cystectomy. Their findings are published in a recent edition of the peer-reviewed publication, the British Journal of Urology-International.

Led by NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell's Dr. Douglas Scherr, the study shows that the robotic approach provides similar benefits to prostate resection, including dramatically faster recoveries with equal, or better, surgical precision. Specifically, robotic cystectomy patients have an average hospital stay of five days, compared with eight days for the standard open bladder surgery.

BOSTON--Scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute report they have blocked the development of prostate tumors in cancer-prone mice by knocking out a molecular unit they describe as a "powerhouse" that drives runaway cell growth.

In an article that is being published today as an advanced online publication by the journal Nature, the researchers say the growth-stimulating molecule called p110beta -- part of a cellular signaling network disrupted in several common cancers -- is a promising target for novel cancer therapies designed to shut it down. The report's lead authors are Shidong Jia, MD, PhD, Zhenning Liu, PhD, Sen Zhang PhD, and Pixu Liu, MD, PhD.

Using a breakthrough technology, researchers led by a Weill Cornell Medical College scientist have pinpointed the hormone estrogen as a key player in about half of all prostate cancers.

Estrogen-linked signaling helps drive a discrete and aggressive form of the disease caused by a chromosomal translocation, which in turn results in the fusion of two genes.

"Fifty percent of prostate cancers harbor a common recurrent gene fusion, and we believe that this confers a more aggressive nature to these tumors," explains study senior author Dr. Mark A. Rubin, professor of pathology and laboratory medicine, and vice chair for experimental pathology at Weill Cornell Medical College. Dr. Rubin is also attending pathologist at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.