Ablation, has anyone heard of this type of treatment?

Perhaps it's not as obvious as I thought, but radiation of any sort is certainly to be included in the category of ablation. The advantage of saying "ablation" is that it includes all forms of killing cancer cells or nodules of cancer cells in situ--right where they are, through targeted destruction of all cells in a particular area (and as some have pointed out more or less cells in surrounding areas.
The challenge, of course, is that it won't kill cells that aren't targeted, and it will kill cells that aren't cancerous.
Some of the treatment strategies do not require physical penetration of the body cavity. They suffer from the challenge of getting destructive power to just the right place from a distance.
Other treatment strategies do require getting to the target (like brachytherapy, which embeds tiny pellets of radioactive material) while other strategies require getting close (like HIFU-high intensity focused ultrasound, which typically works from within the urethra.)
Most of the time, ablation is offered as an option to men with cancer that is identified through biopsy as 7=3+4 or less, i.e. intermediate favorable or lower grade cancers. When the cancer is apparently limited to one or two identifiable (and reachable) nodules in the prostate, ablation may slow the progress of the cancer* without requiring an operation removing the prostate and without killing too much else that will be missed. Since the prognosis without any treatment is typically 15-20 years, the thought is that ablation will lead to an even better prognosis (although this gets hard to measure since life gets in the way over these longer time periods.)
*Some would say "stop," but this in my mind is speculative. All of us in this forum once had prostate cancer even though it was undetected ;-).

Thanks, that was interesting. I just did a bit of research out of curiosity (I wouldn't have been a candidate), and OHIP in Ontario covers the intitial NanoKnife consultations, but not the actual treatment (yet).

Etymology has little to do with modern meanings, but in case it's helpful:

Latin "ab" = "away (from)"

Latin "latio" = "(the act of) carrying"

So "ablation" comes from "carrying away", just like "translation" comes from "carrying across," e.g. from one language to another.

(It's nice to be able to post about something I've been properly trained in for a change, so I can skip the "layperson" warning. 🙂)

Ah, you bring me back to Catholic high school where 4 years of Latin was mandatory. I LOVED it! Most didn’t but it is probably the most useful subject I ever studied - use it to this day when I come across a word I never heard before. And it really comes in handy when doing crossword puzzles.
It has very strict and complex rules of syntax - every word in a sentence has to agree in case, number and gender and the verb tenses are unreal!
Most kids today cannot even speak the language of their native country properly, let alone a ‘dead’ ancient one

I received an ablation treatment known as Irreversible Electroporation (IRE). Here is some info from my experience:

1) If you’ve had a biopsy, request a decipher test on the tissue from your biopsy. This is a step beyond the Gleason score and helps determine how aggressive your cancer is.

2) Give thought to getting a second opinion from a Cancer Center of Excellence. Here's a link:
https://www.cancer.gov/research/infrastructure/cancer-centers/find
3) If your tumor(s) are contained within the prostate, focal treatment is something to look in to. These treatments use a variety of ways to ablate (kill) the tumor(s) without removal or radiation. Look up things like HIFU, cryotherapy, Irreversible Electroporation (IRE), and others.
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/focal-therapy-for-prostate-cancer
My PSA score that got the urologist's attention was 4.25. A follow-up MRI indicated two tumors, both contained within the prostate, and both with a PI-RADS of 4. My biopsy showed a Gleason score of 3+4=7 (intermediate risk, favorable) and my decipher results indicated low risk, making me a candidate for active surveillance or focal therapy. I chose focal treatment because one of the tumors was abutting the edge of the prostate. I had the IRE treatment in January 2024 at the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa. After the treatment, I had some relatively mild incontinence which has mostly cleared up. I also had some blood in my urine for about six weeks after the treatment, but that has totally cleared up. My sexual function is unchanged from before the treatment.

In August, my PSA was down to 1.95. The follow up multiparametric MRI (mpMRI), done the same day, showed “post ablation changes of the prostate with no new recurrent tumor in the treatment area and no new suspicious lesions in the prostate”. My doctor said that later, if there is an indication that cancer has returned, I can consider an addition IRE treatment, removal or radiation.

Focal treatment is definitely not for everyone, but with the proper set of circumstances, it would be an alternative worth considering.

Best wishes for a great outcome for whatever treatment you decide upon.