Prostate Cancer Surgery Fails To Cut Death Rate In Study
By Robert Langreth - Jul 18, 2012 11:00 PM CT
"Surgery for prostate cancer was no better in saving lives than observation over a 10-year period, according to one of the first rigorous studies to compare the two approaches in American men with early-stage disease.
The U.S.-funded study assigned 731 men across the country with early prostate cancer to have the gland surgically removed or be observed without any attempt at curative treatment. Ten years later, 47 percent of men in the surgery group had died, mostly from other diseases, versus 49.9 percent who were just watched, results published in the New England Journal of Medicine found. The difference wasn’t statistically meaningful.
The study is certain to fuel the debate over whether doctors are aggressively treating prostate cancer in men who aren’t likely to die from it, causing side effects such as incontinence and impotence."
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