subject: Men Are Likely To Possess A Scant Understanding Of Prostate Cancer, Their Own Chances For The Cancer [print this page] Imagine you are a man and you see your doctor for your yearly checkup. Imagine the physician orders blood tests, including a PSA test for the early detection of prostate cancer. This is how to check whether a male without any symptoms of prostate cancer may actually have it. Imagine the tests came back outside the normal range
Still, a number of doctors do not suggest men who are asymtomatic to test for prostate cancer. They take the position that screening has little, if any, value. One factor, nevertheless, continues to be constant. If of a screening test is abnormal the man ought to be informed about the results and either be referred to a specialist or be advised about the option for diagnostic testing, such as a biopsy. Again, however, some physicians also take the position that, at least under certain situations, a male patient who is diagnosed with prostate cancer does not have to treat it immediately and merely needs to carefully monitor the cancer.
Should this happen, the cancer becomes incurable before the patient turns symptomatic and is finally diagnosed. However, if a doctor noted that the patients prostate was enlarged or there was a nodule on the gland and the PSA test results indicated abnormally high levels of the antigen and the physician did not notify the man of the abnormal results, the man would in all likelihood think that meant the results were all normal.
The longer the delay in finally doing tests that will diagnose the cancer the greater the risk that by the time it is eventually diagnosed the cancer will have reached an advanced stage. This will greatly decrease treatment options, will remove the possibility of a cure, and will shorten the patients life. There are cases that allege a physician did screen a patient and the test results were abnormal yet the doctor failed to inform the patient and failed to follow up.
Screening tests might yield false positives. This means that certain patients with abnormal screening results will not have cancer. But performing screening tests for cancer is meaningless if there is no follow up as it gives the patient a false sense of security thinking he has no cancer as the physician screened him and said nothing to him that the tests showed the possibility of cancer. Physicians typically acknowledge the requirement for follow up if the results of screening tests come back as abnormal.
by: Joseph Hernandez
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