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Original Summaries of Selected CANCERLIT Records
Quality of Life after Treatment for Prostate Cancer
Last modified on:
Tuesday, April 20, 1999 10:52:30
Copyright © 1994-2008, Information Ventures, Inc.
Two studies approach the issue of just how much benefit
prostate cancer patients actually derive from therapeutic
interventions. Present-day surgical approaches are aimed at nerve
sparing to control side effects of impotence and urinary
incontinence. Do they actually work? A paper from the Dana-Farber
Cancer Institute in Boston ( Talcott; ICDB/95613774) suggests the
procedures might not do what is claimed of them. In this small
study, the 74 patients who received nerve-sparing radical
prostatectomy were younger, and had substantially better
self-reported pretreatment sexual function than the 29 whose
surgeons did not attempt to spare the nerve bundles. Those
differences decreased or remained stable in the first year after
surgery. The results seen are consistent with the better
post-surgery sexual function following nerve-sparing surgery
reported elsewhere, but selection of those patients with better
pretreatment sexual function for this procedure, rather than
selective preservation of sexual function during surgery could
explain much of the difference. A second study looked at the
quality of life of 173 patients with minimal disease prostate
cancer with no disease-related symptoms who chose no therapy,
combined androgen blockade, luteinizing hormone releasing hormone
(LHRH), orchiectomy, estrogen or flutamide. A 49-item validated
questionnaire assessed fatigue, psychological distress, physical
functioning, sexual problems and overall quality of life. Carried
out at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York (Herr;
ICDB/95613751), the findings were that despite the survival
advantages of hormone therapy, the quality of life was better (p =
0.01) for those not treated.
November, 1995
Copyright (c) 1994-2008, Information Ventures, Inc.
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