Category: Imaging & mpMRI

If you had prostate cancer (PCa) and opted to be treated with either prostatectomy (surgical removal) or whole-gland radiation, what sign of recurrence would you watch for? You’d be sure to have an annual PSA blood test. Why? Because after whole-gland treatment, it is expected that your PSA will drop to zero (or very close keep reading

Advances in medicine sometimes involve hybrid technologies, often with stunning results. Just as hybrid cars produce vehicles that offer the best of two worlds in one, integrating two different medical imaging technologies can accomplish the same goal. PET and MRI scans Combining Positron Emitting Tomography (PET) scanning with Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) boosts the accuracy keep reading

Contrast agent Before addressing the title question regarding safety, it’s important to understand what a contrast agent does during MRI prostate imaging. Multiparametric MRI (mpMRI) of the prostate relies on two or more imaging sequences, or parameters, each of which depicts certain tissue characteristics that the others do not. When the results are synchronized, we keep reading

I have written in the past about the problems with using prostate specific antigen (PSA) as a screening tool for prostate cancer. Virtually all men over age 40 know they should have a PSA blood test at their annual exam, yet few have a complete understanding of what it really says... keep reading

Fourteen months prior to the time of this writing, the world began locking down due to the emerging SARS-CoV-2 viral pandemic and the potentially deadly COVID illness it causes. We were all confused, and studies repeatedly show that normal screening for cancers such as breast, prostate and colorectal dropped significantly... keep reading

Beyond doubt, PSA screening for prostate cancer (PCa) has saved hundreds of thousands of lives since the blood test was introduced in the mid-1990s. However, the classical screening strategy involved a pathway from a suspiciously high or rising PSA directly to... keep reading

No one is born knowing the names of all the objects around them. We learn them as parents, older siblings and others show us the object and say its name, or point to things in picture books and repeat the word that matches it. We learn words like cup, ball, shoe, bunny, blanket for items keep reading

Did your doctor say it’s time for a biopsy, based on your PSA results? Do you shudder at the idea? How do you know you really need to have 12+ randomly placed needles throughout your prostate gland? The answers to these questions can be found in a Swedish paper published online July 9, 2021 by keep reading

The growing use of terms like “indolent PCa” and “insignificant PCa” signal recognition that a) not every low-risk PCa tumor needs to be treated immediately, and b) some PCa tumors may never need to be treated at all! keep reading