How to increase prostate cancer awareness & funding?

Right you are. Good points . The digital exam has SO many faults , PSA track and double time is a better method prior to biopsy . Better standard of care. You can only feel 20% of the prostate at the maximum of the digital exam. PSA is much better marker and then you can transgress to the MRI with contrast which gave you a pretty good look at the pelvic bed. Any lesions would show up like my triple 7 on the radar screen. Yes, we have come along way with tech technologies in the healthcare system. I wish Canada would have a proton radiation therapy machines in every major hospital. This is a glaring gap. Also PSMA pet scanners are needed in each hospital as well. Crucial equipment that the USA has and we don't. We pay big bucks for our insurance. We should have these devices. But you're right we have come a long way. We can talk about our bodies now, imagine that. Some Canadians culturally think that men are not all toxic, imagine that. That's real progress in itself. But let's not get an over our skis here , I think the Canadian culture still dictates that men are toxic. That's what I see every second commercial say anyway. The buffoon man trying to do laundry the buffoon man trying to cut the lawn, the buffoon man trying to look after their children. It's really insulting. You don't see this in the Philippines, germany, Hungary, or even Spain. In Canada, it's common. Have a great day, sir. Thank you for your valid points.

You hear people say oh you got the good one. It ain’t so good for me and I imagine all of us. Cancer is a horrible disease that hits a lot of us when we’re at our most vulnerable part of our lives 65 and over.

@taeguab Yes. This. Or my old favourite when you talk about prostate removal: "That's OK.. you've got another one".

@peterj116 they thought we have 2 no that’s the cojones. LOL

Ask the Sec. of HHS.

@taeguab We have 2 everything, don't we?

You could be more fairly comparing prostate cancer research dollars to cervical cancer research dollars. But there isn't a competition between cancers. If you want more dollars for your particular cancer, contribute more.
The threat to research--https://www.higheredjobs.com/articles/articleDisplay.cfm?ID=4519

Here's a paper on Canadian research funding for site-specific cancers in 2015:
https://crdcn.ca/publication/discrepancies-between-canadian-cancer-research-funding-and-site-specific-cancer-burden/
Best funded: leukemia, prostate, and breast (51.3% of all cancer research funding combined)

Least funded: uterus, pancreas, and ovary (7.8% of all cancer research funding combined)

Worst funded proportional to cancer burdon: lung, uterus, and colorectal

Women would have a legitimate complaint over how seriously underfunded uterine and ovarian cancer research is.

@northoftheborder How much (and why) private and public funding for diseases and illnesses occurs is complicated.

(Referring to only those cancers you’ve mentioned), due to the highest number of diagnosed cases, breast and prostate cancers get the most attention. (Breast cancer funding/research has decades head start over prostate cancer.) As a result, mortality rates on both cancers are now some of the lowest. (Yet, both cancers are dwarfed by cardiovascular disease deaths.)

Uterine (cervical) cancer has a 2.5x-3.0x higher mortality rate than either breast or prostate cancer, but affects few annually (cases: 13,820; deaths: 4,360). (Uterine corpus cancer has an even lower mortality rate than cervical cancer, but again affects much fewer than breast or prostate cancers.)

Same with pancreatic cancer - it has the highest mortality rate of all cancers (78%), but affects few in comparison to breast and prostate cancers. (My older brother died of pancreatic cancer in October 2024; that’s when I started looking into these mortality rates.)

Ovarian cancer is an interesting one. It also has a high mortality rate (65% - 2nd highest mortality rate in the cancers you mentioned), but affects very few annually (cases: 19,680; deaths: 12,740).

However, there has been so much research done with ovarian cancer that there is a test for it - it’s called the CA125 test. It measures levels of the CA 125 protein, primarily used to help diagnose, monitor treatment, or check for recurrence in ovarian cancer. (Comparable to how a PSA test measures levels of the PSA protein, primarily used to “help diagnose, monitor treatment, or check for recurrence” in prostate cancer.)

But, just like with a PSA test where many things can cause PSA to rise, many things can cause a CA125 to rise so, the test isn’t offered as a standard test. That 65% mortality rate in ovarian cancer would be much (much) lower with early detection if women asked for the CA125 test at about 40y-45y old (just as PSA tests are recommended for men starting at about 45y).

How much and why private-sector and public sector funding for diseases and illnesses occurs is complicated. With limited dollars, the need - however that’s determined - will be the key driver.

(Data are from the American Cancer Society, 2024: https://acsjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.3322/caac.21820)

So true