Promoting Wellness Beyond Hormone Therapy, Second Edition. Mark A. Moyad
dealing with your health, knowledge and action equal power!
Chapter eleven will help you anticipate and mitigate the potential side effects of the various treatments. Understanding and alleviating those effects will improve your comfort during treatment. We’ll consider lifestyle changes, nutritional options, supplements, and prescription medications to give you a variety of choices.
In chapter twelve, we’ll review diet, supplements, and alternative medicinal therapies that can enhance your well-being, both during treatment and in general.
As you reach the end of the book, hopefully you’ll have a new wealth of knowledge to consider and discuss with your healthcare providers in setting up the best care plan for your situation. This is the most optimistic time for men with hormone-refractory prostate cancer, with new treatments testing all the time. In the two short years since the first edition was published, there were three new life-extending drugs to add to our second edition! Just remember, especially in dealing with cancer, combining knowledge and action really equals power!
Mark A. Moyad, MD, MPH
Jenkins/Pokempner Director of
Preventive & Alternative Medicine
University of Michigan Medical Center–
Department of Urology
The impact of support and advocacy groups on men and their families can be life changing. These groups are some of the most up-to-date resources patients can use for awareness, education, research, clinical trials, drug access, insurance issues, and political advocacy for prostate cancer research.
ADVOCACY AND SUPPORT ORGANIZATIONS
Alliance for Prostate Cancer Prevention www.apcap.org
American Cancer Society www.cancer.org
American Society of Clinical Oncology www.asco.org
American Urological Association www.auanet.org
CancerCare www.cancercare.org
Chemotherapy Care www.chemocare.com
Clinical Trials Recruiting, Ongoing & Completed www.clinicaltrials.gov
Foundation for Cancer Research and Education www.cancer-foundation.org
HRPCa.org. www.hrpca.org
MaleCare www.malecare.org
Man to Man, local groups of the American Cancer Society www.cancer.org
Malecare Advanced Prostate Cancer Program www.advancedprostatecancer.net
National Alliance of State Prostate Cancer Coalitions www.naspcc.org
National Comprehensive Cancer Network www.nccn.org
Patient Advocates for Advanced Cancer Treatments www.paactusa.org
Prostate Cancer Foundation www.pcf.org
Prostate Cancer Info Link http://prostatecancerinfolink.net
Prostate Cancer Research and Education Foundation www.pcref.org
Prostate Cancer Research Institute www.prostate-cancer.org
Prostate Conditions Education Council www.prostateconditions.org
Prostate Forum www.prostateforum.com
Prostate Health Education Network, Inc. (PHEN) www.prostatehealthed.org
The Prostate Net www.prostate.net
Us TOO International Prostate Cancer Education and Support Network www.ustoo.org
Zero—The Project to End Prostate Cancer www.zerocancer.org
Questions and Answers to Start
When a patient is confronted with prostate cancer that is advancing, certain important questions come to mind almost immediately. It seemed to make the most sense to put those questions on the table first and provide some general answers before we get into more depth in upcoming chapters.
Question 1: What is hormone-refractory prostate cancer (HRPC)?
Men most commonly are considered to have hormone-refractory prostate cancer when their prostate specific antigen level, or PSA, starts to rise while on hormone therapy (also called androgen deprivation therapy [ADT] or luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone therapy [LHRH]). However, a small number of men are diagnosed with an advanced stage of prostate cancer prior to receiving any treatment. They are offered ADT the moment the physician finds prostate cancer well beyond the prostate—for example, in the bones.
Over the years, several names have been given to the advanced cancer condition involving a rising PSA after hormone therapy, but in reality all of the names represent somewhat similar stages of prostate cancer. You may hear any of the terms below used:
Androgen-Independent Prostate Cancer (AIPC) The cancer no longer depends on the androgen receptor or androgen signaling for growth and survival.
Castrate-Resistant Prostate Cancer (CRPC) The cancer continues to grow and progress even though a man has only castrate levels of testosterone or male hormone (less than 50 ng/dL [1.7 nmol/L]).
Hormone-Refractory Prostate Cancer (HRPC) The cancer no longer responds to hormone therapy (LHRH, for example). For simplicity, we will use HRPC throughout this book.
Question 2: How did my cancer become “hormone-refractory”?
Unfortunately, despite hormone therapy, some prostate cancers continue to progress, and more treatment is needed.