Will Your Prostate Cancer Recur?

Cancer cell Decipher prostate cancer classifier predicts the aggressiveness of prostate cancer and it's likelihood of recurrence. read more

How Spy Thriller Author Vince Flynn Succumbed to a Silent Killer

How Spy Thriller Author Vince Flynn Succumbed to a Silent Killer Spy Thriller Author Vince Flynn Dead at Age 47 – of Prostate Cancer! by Robert Warren Hess We learned last week that espionage thriller author Vince Flynn died on June 19, 2013, of prostate cancer at age 47. News reports tell us that Flynn was diagnosed in 2010 at age 43 with Stage 3 prostate cancer. Flynn wrote the Mitch Rapp novels about the CIA, three of which reached the Number 2 slot on USA Today’s list of best sellers. Flynn’s diagnosis and death highlight several key points that were made by two doctors on Fox New’s Sunday morning medical show, Housecall . . . Prostate cancer is not an old man’s disease Prostate cancers that appear early generally are aggressive (30,000 men die every year from prostate cancer) It’s critical to get a baseline PSA test at 35 and watch for any changes from one year to the next How to Make Your Prostate Cancer Risk Visible The best early indicator of prostate cancer is the PSA (prostate specific antigen) test. The PSA test isn’t perfect, but it is a good indicator, especially if you track your PSA’s trend over time. A simple way to do this is with […] read more

Prostate Cancer Awareness – A Missed Opportunity

Why do so Many of Us Think About Prostate Cancer Like Joe? by Robert Warren Hess When it comes to prostate cancer, we men are our own worst enemy. We just can’t seem to come to grips with the risk and the testing. I hope the story I’m about to tell will prevent you from becoming a “Joe” and, even better, ensure you don’t become one of the 30,000 American men who die each year from prostate cancer. The story begins about 11:30 am, on Sunday June 2, 2013, as I’m about halfway through my weekend bicycle ride from Manhattan Beach, over the Palos Verdes Peninsula, and up to the antenna farm where the old Nike site was located on top of San Pedro Hill. As usual, I was riding Fast Freddy, my Blinged-out Italian steel bike made by the Renzo Formigli workshop in Florence, Italy. If you’re not a cyclist, Freddy looks pretty normal. But if you are a cyclist, there’s a lot to attract your attention. Here’s what gets the conversation going: lugged steel frame; gold lugs – I think it’s real; deep rim Zipp wheels, and Shimano Ultegra electric shifting. Guys make a comment about Freddy and […] read more

ProstateTracker In Action

What’s Good for the Goose, Is Good for the Gander How many times have we all heard that from our parents and grandparents? The image to the right shows the results of my most recent PSA test. I’m a 10-year prostate cancer survivor so I watch that number like a hawk. The image shows my PSA values beginning in 1994 – that’s the 1.0 number of the far left of the chart – to the point where I was diagnosed. It drops sharply after my surgery in May 2003 and has remained in the .03 – .08 range since then. If the scale looks a bit funny, it’s because we programmed it with a logarithmic function to accommodate a wide range of values. What Did We Include Cholesterol in ProstateTracker? We did this because cholesterol value – total, high, and low – serve as pretty good (but maybe not perfect) overall markers for the body’s general health. If your HDL and LDL numbers are in the ‘good’ or ‘optimal’ ranges, you most likely are in pretty good health. Can You See My Eating Habit Relapse? The green line is LDL (the bad cholesterol) and the brown line is HDL (the […] read more