@chippydoo Those were interesting times. I’ve been getting PSA tests since 2000 (at 45y) with no problems at all; I simply asked for it……

But, here’s what happened regarding PSA tests —> With the understanding that for a Gleason 6, side/after-effects of radical treatment can often be worse than the possible cancer itself.

But, in the early 2000s, so many men were opting for radical treatment for just a G6 (usually surgery) when it wasn’t medically necessary, that in 2012 the United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommended against routine prostate cancer screening thinking that stopping screening would stop overtreatment (assigning PSA screening a “D” recommendation: https://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/recommendation/prostate-cancer-screening-2012). Some doctors followed that USPSTF recommendation, some did not.

As it turned out, that knee-jerk reaction had bad downstream consequences, and resulted in many of the advanced cases we see today. But, it was as a direct result of so many unnecessary radical treatments for G6 and the quality of life impacts they caused.

Since then (in 2018) the USPSTF updated their recommendation to a “C” (https://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/recommendation/prostate-cancer-screening).

(Compare that to the “B” recommendation they give to breast cancer screening.)