Adding radiation treatment to hormone therapy for older men with aggressive prostate cancer could cut the death rate by up to 50 percent, a new study shows.
About 40 percent of older men with aggressive prostate cancer are treated with hormone therapy alone, without any radiation. Penn Medicine researchers analyzed 31,541 prostate cancer cases and found that adding radiation to hormone drug therapy resulted in a 57 percent reduction in prostate cancer deaths.
The study, published in the
Journal of Clinical Oncology, was done on men with locally advanced prostate cancer, which is cancer that has spread outside but near the prostate gland.
“Failure to use effective treatments for older patients with cancer is a healthcare quality concern in the United States. Radiation plus hormone therapy is such a treatment for men with aggressive prostate cancers,” said lead author Dr. Justin E. Bekelman.
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