Improved prostate cancer testing using MRI Scan
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By James GallagherHealth and science reporter, BBC News website 20 Jan 2017
"The biggest leap in diagnosing prostate cancer "in decades" has been made using new scanning equipment, say doctors and campaigners.
Using advanced MRI nearly doubles the number of aggressive tumours that are caught.
And the trial on 576 men, published in the Lancet, showed more than a quarter could be spared invasive biopsies, which can lead to severe side-effects.
The NHS is already reviewing whether the scans can be introduced widely.
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in British men, and yet testing for it is far from perfect.
If men have high prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels in the blood, they go for a biopsy.
Twelve needles then take random samples from the whole of the prostate.
It can miss a cancer that is there, fail to spot whether it is aggressive, and cause side-effects including bleeding, serious infections and erectile dysfunction.
"Taking a random biopsy from the breast would not be accepted, but we accept that in prostate," said Dr Hashim Ahmed, a consultant and one of the researchers.
Around 100,000 to 120,000 men go through this every year in the UK.
Scanning
The trial, at 11 hospitals in the UK, used multi-parametric MRI on men with high PSA levels.
It showed 27% of the men did not need a biopsy at all."
1 like, 24 replies
philip1950 CaptainAl
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derek76 philip1950
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They are evidently selective in the scans they will do. I had an MRI compatible pace maker fitted at the hospital in 2015 but InHealth have not yet agreed a protocol for scanning patients with them.
Theoc derek76
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derek76 Theoc
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Waiting times for private appointments are being extended now mainly because the the consultants are Moonlighting at the private hospitals.
mikemh CaptainAl
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The sad thing is how long this knowledge takes to get out into common knowledge, and particularly how long it takes before all the medical establishment reacts.
It is also sad how behind the times the BBC reporting is
CaptainAl mikemh
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In fairness to the Beeb, they were reporting on a report published in the 'Lancet' medical journal on 19th January 2017 about the results on the PROMIS study group on prostate cancer detection: (Very interesting report & worth googling)
"Our study found that using the two tests could reduce over-diagnosis of harmless cancers by 5%, prevent 1 in 4 men having an unnecessary biopsy, and improve the detection of aggressive cancers from 48% to 93%."
geoff90305 CaptainAl
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Downloaded the report. Good to see they are giving the MRI a chance. Interesting they used the Tesla 1.5, as considered common when compared to the Tesla 3.0, while better, not that available as yet.
Show a guy a MRI image of his cancer, and he is commited to fixing it. Just tell him his PSA said he had a problem..maybe,,and should have a biopsy...which may find the cancer..or may not..and liable to give him a serious infection..Again, the MRI is so "black and white".