Posted by Ken Dunnington [97.118.186.93] on Thursday, March 13, 2014 at 09:08:05 :
In Reply to: Re: Lost a friend posted by Bill Garland [63.66.64.247] on Thursday, March 13, 2014 at 06:04:38 :
From my understanding, as a one time test it's not particularly reliable as an indicator for cancer. It is most useful as a baseline to watch over time(years) in the individual and then make decisions based on *changes* in the PSA readings for the particular individual.
As with everything else cancer related, it's a process of refinement and discovery in the development of predicting, detecting and treating it. Thus state-of-the-art today will not necessarily be so tomorrow.
The PSA test is a tool for early detection and as it is not absolute it should be considered in light of costs, false-positives, family history, etc just as a mammogram is for women.
My father had baseline PSA tests done for years and when one indicated a possible issue a biopsy was done to provide more info. He had zero symptoms other than the elevated(for him) PSA. One would not want to biopsy just for the heck of it. His cancer was found in an early stage and was successfully removed/treated over five years ago. In his case, PSA was valuable in providing early detection which is related to higher success rates for treatment with lower adverse side-effects.
Ken