Re: Re: ProstRcision?

[Guest guest]

Thanks for your info!!VanTo: ProstateCancerSupport Sent: Sun, April 11, 2010 8:48:46 AMSubject: Re: ProstRcision?

I tried to look into ProstRcision and RCOG. None of

the RO’s I spoke with at mainstream Cancer Centers held them in high

regard, but some of the guys they have treated seem to be near fanatic cult

like advocates for ProstRcision and Dr. Critz, the founder of RCOG. Apparently

they hold annual re-union seminars. ProstRcision is a trademarked name for Simultaneous

Irradiation (SI) Brachytherapy + EBRT and it is sort of a small franchise. Dr

Critz seems to have been well regarded in the early development of modern

Brachytherapy (1990’s) and has published a number of articles. He

pioneered their current SI process in 1992 and presented a paper some ten year

later in 2003 to the American Urological Association. That presentation was

an update on their SI protocol to include some patients that had been treated

up to 10 years. Of 1457 patients in this study, the number that had been

treated 10 years is not stated, nor is the staging of those “10 yearâ€

patients, but it wouldn’t be very many. The Study’s overall

staging is T1T2NxM0 LOCALIZED PCa. The study indicates staging is

consistent with the 1992 criteria and all men were treated 5 or more year

ago. Localized PCa risk groups are reported as Low(50%), Inter(31%),

Hi(19%). Contact me if you would like a copy of this Study (which I couldn’t

find on the ProstRcison site – or much else they referenced). The 10 year disease free cure rates they currently advertise

seem to be based on this old study and they go on to compare their results to

published studies that are also real old (hard to find) and are not reflective

of current treatment protocols. Keep in mind that eight year old EBRT (IMRT, Proton) comparisons

are from an era when targeting was comparatively poor and limited to about 65Gy.

Today it is precisely targeted with IGRT at about 80Gy. It is hard to get

good 10 year data because the technology becomes obsolete in about half that

time. Mainstream Centers seem to be moving away from combo approaches like SI

since their studies have not shown it to be more effective than current mono-therapy

approaches. Personally I am leery of treatment centers that ‘hawk’

their cure with dubious claims and discredit other protocols that are well

supported by major accredited Cancer Center, NIH, NCI, NCCN, ASTRO, AUA,

etc... Nevertheless ProstRcision is probably still a good approach for

Localized PCa – low and Intermediate risk groups (as is EBRT,

Brachytherapy, RP).