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Better Late Than Never

Getting the PSA & Gleason score

Having been going to a urologist for over 10 years, he asked when my last PSA was. I said, in the 68 years I have been on this earth, I never had one. So he said it is about time (do you think I said to myself). Took the test and it came out to be 5.5 and did another specialized PSA test and it came out higher at 6.0. The doctor then did a biopsy taking out 12 core samples. 10 were cancerous with a Gleason score of 4+3=7.

Treatment begins

Sent me to his surgeon who was young and would not operate on the prostate. He then put me on hormone therapy, first on Firmagon, then every three months on Trelstar for a period of 2 years. Developed rashes from Frimagon and hot flashes every two hours on Trelstar. Had four injections and did a blood test because being diabetic, I could not bring down the blood sugar number. Showed the report to the urologist but he kept insisting to continue. I walked out because I would never make two years of this.

Deciding what I need to do

Joined a prostate support group who helped me decide what course of action I needed to do. Decided on Proton therapy. Had markers and hydro-gel put in. Needed to do 44 treatments. At 22 treatments, I decided to do a PSA test to see what is happening. Guess what? PSA down to 0.1. Finished 44 treatments and because of going off hormone therapy doctor said the PSA will be higher but it wasn't. After 3 weeks it only went up to 0.2. After 6 months, PSA went down to 0.1. So far prostate cancer is in remission.

This article represents the opinions, thoughts, and experiences of the author; none of this content has been paid for by any advertiser. The ProstateCancer.net team does not recommend or endorse any products or treatments discussed herein. Learn more about how we maintain editorial integrity here.

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