Prostate Cancer Radiation Treatment: Is it for You?

First a note of caution:

This article is not intended as medical advice, nor should it be taken as medical advice.
It is for informational purposes only.
As always with a physical illness you should consult your personal physician right away.

Prostate cancer radiation treatment (also referred to as Radiotherapy)
may not be the best treatment for you if you have prostate cancer.

In fact, depending on your age and health it may be years
before radiation treatment becomes necessary.

Radiation therapy is only one of the therapies you and your doctor will have to decide on.
These tips will give you an idea of which type of therapy or combination of therapies
you should ask your doctor about.

One of the first things you need to know is that a prostate malignancy
is perhaps one of the slowest growing tumors of all the other cancers.

Because it is so slow growing years may pass with out any noticeable growth of the tumor.
When this happens your doctor will generally tell you that you are in Stage One of the disease.

This means your attending physician may well take a "wait and see" attitude
before, he or she, decides what course of action to take.

You may even think the doctor is being somewhat cavalier about the whole thing.
Rest assured though your doctor is not being cavalier.

He or she is doing what most practicing physicians will do
when you are first diagnosed with prostrate cancer
and making the decision if prostate cancer radiation treatment is needed.

During this "wait and see" period your doctor will monitor you closely.

There are several tests your physician will use to do this.
Actually there is no one test which can determine on its own if you have prostate cancer.

Perhaps the most common one is a test known as the Digital Rectal Examination.

More than likely this is the test your doctor may have used to decide you may have a problem with your prostate.

This test is quite simple, but uncomfortable, requires the doctor to insert a gloved finger up the rectum.

Doing so enables them to feel the prostate and tumors,
enabling them to tell if there has been a change in the size of the tumor or additional tumors have formed.

There are other tests such as the PSA blood test.

The PSA (Prostate Specific Antigen)
is a protein which is produced by (you guest it) the prostate gland.

Small amounts of the protein pass into the body through the blood.
A normal PSA count, in the blood, is between zero and four.
However, depending on your age it could be higher.

Once it reaches a level of 10 or more it can indicate the possibility of prostate cancer.

But the truth is other physical conditions could also have the level that high -
that is why a PSA test is not the only test used to detect the malignancy.

Additional blood tests and other tests are used to finalize the diagnosis
and to form a plan of attack on the disease.

One form of attack may be the use of prostate cancer radiation treatment.

The Radiotherapy is when your doctor will use a high intensity x-ray to beam radiation directly onto the prostate.
This is done in small doses of a few minutes duration at a time.

In most cases you will be able to return home the same day.
Normally this therapy will be recommended instead of surgery only if the disease is localized.

There are many tests and other factors for your doctor to consider
before they decide that prostate cancer radiation treatment
is the best treatment for you.