New NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines for AS

[Guest guest]

There is a good piece at

the New Prostate Cancer Infolink site concerning a revised guideline for Active

Surveillance issued by National Comprehensive Cancer

Network (NCCN) at

http://prostatecancerinfolink.net/2010/01/07/nccn-updates-prostate-cancer-management-guidance/

? Or s http://tinyurl.com/ybzebw3 in

case the longer link breaks up.

Unfortunately neither

Mike nor the Press Release referred to define the new 'very low' risk

diagnosis where AS is recommended as the primary choice where a man has less

than a 20 year life expectancy. The definition is similar to the old

'insignificant tumour' definition and is:

1. Stage T1 or T2a

2. Gleason equal to or

less than 6 (yesterday's announcement said there was no Gleason Score less than

6 other than for chips from a TURP)

3. PSA less than 10 ng/ml

4. Three or fewer biopsy

cores with 50% or less positive material in each core

5. PSA density less than

0.15 ng/ml/g

Another small step on the

long road to reducing the number of unnecessary interventions. Not too sure how

certainly anyone can predict a 20 year individual life expectancy!!

All the best

Terry Herbert

I have no medical qualifications but I was diagnosed

in ‘96: and have learned a bit since then.

My sites are at www.yananow.net

and www.prostatecancerwatchfulwaiting.co.za

Dr

“Snuffy” Myers : " As a physician, I am painfully aware that most of the decisions

we make with regard to prostate cancer are made with inadequate data "