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Anyone “below detection" with an ultra sensitive PSA test?
Prostate Cancer | Last Active: 11 hours ago | Replies (23)Comment receiving replies
@melvinw LabCorp charges 5x as much for uPSA that goes to .002 vs. their standard that goes to .1; so now more of a commercial / marketing reason (LabCorp is the only one to go to 3 decimals) vs. medical. The standard Quest PSA goes to .02 and is priced competitively with LabCorp's standard PSA. Most labs report to 2 decimal places on standard PSA tests now. There are over 5 different methods of PSA lab analysis. Quest, LabCorp std., and LabCorp uPSA use 3 slightly different methods. That is why it is recommended to get the PSA with the same lab. LabCorp may report standard PSA to 1 decimal to market their uPSA test. Other labs us the same PSA analysis and report std. PSA to .02.
Replies to "@melvinw LabCorp charges 5x as much for uPSA that goes to .002 vs. their standard that..."
@jim18 Yes, my hospital lab goes only down to 0.01, not 0.002. OTOH, I get the results in a couple of hours, since they do the test in the same hospital campus (they stop by every hour on the half-hour at the clinic with a cart to pick up the samples and wheel them to the main hospital lab, and I can almost predict when results will pop online now, based on when they draw the blood).
Cost isn't an issue here in Ontario, fortunately. I didn't ask for uPSA, and didn't even realise I was getting it at first: it seems just to be the default for someone under the care of the regional cancer centre.
I'm sure the routine annual screening test, for those who've never had prostate cancer, is still down to only 0.1, but you wouldn't have that done by a hospital lab here.
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@jim18 Thanks, great info. Yes, from here forward I am using the uPSA test from Labcorp. I even go to the same collection center and always check to see if the sample was analyzed at the same lab.