Prostate cancer better diagnosed in urine tests than PSA

Men are 33% more likely to develope prostate cancer than women are to develop breast cancer. Prostate cancer is the most common cancerous disease for older male population. By statistics, from every 4 prostatecancer patients, 3 are over 65 aged.

Screening for prostate cancer, men middle-aged and seniors often get PSA tests. In many cases PSA testing is unrelevant as many men with normal test results are prostate cancer sufferers.

According to a new study [February 2005] a simple urine test may improve the diagnosis and treatment of this male disease. The results come from a preliminary study from Children's Hospital Boston, led by Dr. Bruce Zetter.

He is especially interested in a protein that sustain malignum tumour development by stimulating cell migration It is called thymosin ß15 and promotes metastasis in prostate cancer. Dr. Zetter's study revealed that this protein is produced almost exclusively by cancerous cells, it is detectable in urine and should be the next target in treatment methods.

In this study, Zetter and colleagues used about 300 urine samples from patients and comparted to other 53 healthy men samples serving as controls. From above 300 male patients, 121 were with prostate cancer treatment, 81 with non-malignant prostatis, 73 with urologic diseases like urinary tract infection and 15 with kidney or bladder cancer.

The results revelead:

1. the protein thymosin ß15 levels were elevated in men with untreated or aggressive prostate cancer, but near-normal or normal in men with other diseases or in healthy men.
2. urine samples of men with aggressive cancerous prostate disease were 12 times more likely than the healthy controls to have elevated thymosin ß15.

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