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There is no evidence to support Dr Dattoli's claims, except Dr Dattoli's statements.
What has become clear over the years I have been watching and reading and thinking about all the information that comes flooding into our computers is that most of claims made for 'new' treatments - how much better they are, how few negative consequences they create - are shown to be incorrect once it is possible for outside parties to examine the data, as opposed to the claims.
Of course I am not saying that Dr Dattoli is not correct in his claims.Just that there is no good evidence.
The other thing I look when trying to evaluate the accuract of claims is to try to find oter claims that can be checked.
In Dr Dattoli's case, a youngish man mailed me with questions about what to do ect and forwarded to me a copy of a mail from the Dattoli Center justifying the expensive tests (run by the Dattoli Center labs) and the expensive and extensive therapies offered. The reason that was given for the necessity for this was that younger men had more aggresive cancers.
Now that is a subject that has interested me from Day One, because I was 'young' when I was diagnosed, yet I have never been able to find any good data that supports this view. So, with the permission of the man, I mailed Dattoli Center and asked politely if I could have the references of the studies that supported the statement. The response I got was from the Marketing Department (which I thought was interesting) saying that they couldn't give the references, but they would get Dr Dattoli to send them on to me.
After a reasonable time had elapsed I wrote a second mail asking for the information only to be told that the statement was based on their experience. That's OK from one point of view, I do believe that anecdotal experience has a place in a decision tree, but.......I think it should be made very clear that there is no published, indpendent data to support the statement.
It is not for me to say if you should use Dattoli or not, but before you do, perhaps you should evlauate the Datolli Center Prostate Cancer Treatment Chart for yourself and see if you can spot the marketing v facts items. If you have the time and the interest look up the studies quoted to see if they support the statements made.
Peet,
If your local RO has experience, which seems that he does, and you feel comfortable with him, then there should be no reason to spend more money going to Dattoli.
It helps to have other perspectives on the myriad of options. Here is one small example with just the blood test. Local RO orders CBC w differential, CMP, PAP and PSA.
The other clinic, those plus 20 others, including one that the blood lab was unable able to do. I opted for the more extensive blood test thinking it has to be better?? and I can use it whichever RO I go with. Ten vials of blood taken.
The question is , was the additional 20 tests necessary, both RO's working off the same reports? How can I possibly sort this out?(more of a rhetorical question)
I had my treatment in Palm Desert Ca. Dr Peter Greenberg at 21st Century Oncology was my RO and his partner, Dr Maseck, did the seeds.
He was referred to me by my oncologist,Dr Scholz, who said that his work was some of the best he had seen. It certainly was the case in my experience, as psa went from 40 to .1 immediately and has stayed there for 4 years and I have absolutely no side effects from the treatments.
There are some very good local ROs around, but unless you have someone that has seen and can compare their work to others, we as patients just don't have the experience to rate them.
I firmly believe that the RO's skill and experience is the major factor in the results you will get.
