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Weighing the cancer risk reduction & quality-of-life cost of ADT?
Prostate Cancer | Last Active: Feb 13 5:00pm | Replies (123)Comment receiving replies
Let me further explain why I am wrestling with the "ADT or no ADT, and if yes for how long ?" question.
For a person of my cancer profile, doing adjunct RT at a top medical center like UCLA under acclaimed oncologists like Dr. Amar Kishan is a no brainer since it will reduce my BCR chance by about 65% and increase my overall survival (10-12) years by about 70%. And I am learning that adding ADT may improve these percentages by 15-20% and 5-10% respectively. But I have also seen stats that not ALL patients get these benefits. In fact only a small minorty benefit from ADT; one 1 in 8 or 1 in 10!!
So everyone who adds ADT to RT is guaranteed to have side effects of varying degrees, but ONLY 1 in 8 or 1 in 10 get any benefits?
For nerdy folks like me, the cost to value ratio of ADT is very suspect , but I will continue to dig in into these numbers and learn from my chohorts and experts like Dr. Kishan. For example, I woud like to know from Dr Kishan does the 1 in 8 or 1 in 10 average number also apply to high risk folks lke me, or high risk folks benefit at a much higher rate like 1 in 2 or 1 in 3?
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@soli During my recent 02/04 visit to the Emory Proton Beam Center, the R/O gave to me the same 70% and 5% numbers. Along with many of the stories of quality of life degradation of ADT, I also see that a side effect is blood clots. I have a history of pulmonary embolism, which is another reason at this time my decision is to forgo ADT treatment.
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@soli
Where did you get this Information that one in eight get benefit from ADT. The benefit from ADT is that it stops your metastasis from growing and keeps any cancer from starting to grow. This happens for everyone that takes ADT so I don’t understand what you mean by getting no benefit from it, it benefits everyone.
If you mean, that people who take nothing do just as well as those that take, it may be a little deceptive since those that don’t get it have lower level prostate cancer cases, So they Aren’t expected to have further issues. That’s what happened with me.
I know for me I didn’t get ADT after surgery and it was 3 1/2 years before it came back. In my case, the cancer was isolated in my prostate, and it was removed. I was only a Gleason 4+3. I did get it just before salvage radiation, But went almost 2 1/2 years without it before it came back again. Since then, it kept me alive, My cancer would grow constantly if I didn’t take it. That’s true for many people who have advanced cases or have reoccurrences.