Tag: focal therapy

No doubt you’ve heard it before, and for sure you’ll hear it again. Radical prostatectomy (RP) is the “gold standard” of prostate cancer (PCa) treatment. Sounds impressive, right? When most people hear that phrase, they assume it means the best. However, a standard simply means a baseline against which other things in the same category keep reading

How can prostate cancer treatment affect your sex life? Let me count the ways: Damage to the nerves that control erection Loss of ejaculate due to gland removal or whole-gland ablation Loss of desire and/or erectile dysfunction as a result of androgen deprivation therapy Psychological/identity/self-esteem issues that affect performance According to clinical psychologist Leslie Schover, keep reading

One of the ongoing themes in my blogs is the importance of matching a patient’s prostate cancer with the treatment for which he is best qualified. The lower the risk, the more treatment options will be open, possibly including focal therapy. However, “bulky” intermediate-to-high risk prostate cancer excludes focal treatment because it requires a more aggressive approach... keep reading

The Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) was founded in 1915. It now has over 54,000 members. There are not only radiologists, but also other medical professionals and even medical physicists. At its annual gathering, its huge attendance makes it one of the largest medical conferences in the world... keep reading

Here’s the back story: there is a British clinician/researcher, Hashim Ahmed, whose published articles I respect. His publications often include Mark Emberton, another esteemed British urologist, so when both names turn up in the same group of authors on a published paper, it grabs my attention. This is the case with a 2020 multicenter study keep reading

Multiparametric MRI (mpMRI) has sparked a revolution in prostate cancer (PCa) detection, diagnosis and image-guided treatments. Transrectal ultrasound (TRUS) does not even begin to compare with the anatomic definition and tissue characterization provided by high-resolution, 3D mpMRI scans. This breakthrough technology has been a godsend for patients in such areas as Avoiding unnecessary needle biopsies keep reading

On a daily basis—probably far more than we are aware—we choose one thing or another based on how we perceive the information we have. This car is better than that car, this tomato is perfect but that tomato looks damaged, clean-shaven looks good on me but a beard looks bad. As an ancient metaphor puts keep reading

“In the 100 years from the mid-15th to the mid-16th century, a combination of circumstances stimulated men to seek new routes, and it was new routes rather than new lands that filled the minds of kings and commoners, scholars and seamen.”– Encyclopedia Britannica When the 15th century launched the Age of Discovery, it was actually keep reading

MRI-guided focused ultrasound is a new noninvasive focal treatment approach for localized low- and intermediate-risk prostate cancer. It has been in clinical study the in the U.S. for the past several years in order to evaluate its safety, effectiveness and side effect profile. The Sperling Prostate Center, along with eight other important medical centers, is keep reading

“Introducing the ultimate technology in Precision Medicine for Prostate Focal Therapy.” “TSPA is the only technology designed for Prostate Focal Therapy” These bold claims announce the availability of Tissue Sparing Prostate Ablation (TSPA), known by its brand name as Encage. Encage uses a specific type of radiofrequency ablation (RFA), which basically cooks a tumor by keep reading