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So the jousting, in the spirit of Valentine's Day, has stopped, with the readers being the winners.
The current exchange presented the rest of us much critical food for thought, much like the thread back in 2009. I foolishly did not bookmark the link to that thread. Could you re-post it?
Not sure which thread you are after, Jack, because there were two that I mentioned in my exchanges with John.
1. The first one was a thread in December 2009 titled Neo-Adjuvant PSA drop when John left this Forum (apparently forever) expressing his dissatisfaction at the way the Forum was run, and specifically the way I "spread misinformation" saying:
Terry we have discussed misinformation before, and you know I have strong views about the spreading of. Henceforth I shall no longer post on this forum.
2.The second concerned the established fact that all tumours, including prostate cancer, can and do spontaneously regress. The discussion was in December 2009 Might Negative Second Biopsy Procedures Indicate Spontaneous Regression? and even John had to admit this as a possibility when he said:
….. the notion of spontaneous regression for most types of cancer is not new. Essentially from early childhood the body does produce rogue cells, but the body'd (sic) immune system is very adept at identifying and destroying these. Even in advanced cases of Ca the immune system still functions to a certain degree, but it's efficacy is variable.
Hope this is what you are looking for. You can always find the discussions (and others involving John or any of the other contributors) by simply clicking on their name where it is underlined in the Forum. That will list all posts made by that person and you can click on any of them to access their wise words.
I really am surprised that it is still necessary to have to 'defend' the way that this Forum and the site is run and the information on that is on it. Mark and I get so many mails thanking us for both - why do some people find them useful and others denigrate them so much? It's a bit beyond me at times. I suppose life would be somewhat boring if we agreed all the time - although it would surely help the newly diagnosed if the medicos could agree some of the time!!
>>>>You can always find the discussions (and others involving John or any of the other contributors) by simply clicking on their name where it is underlined in the Forum. That will list all posts made by that person and you can click on any of them to access their wise words.<<<<
I had forgotten that great feature, one of many on this forum. The spellcheck is welcome. I get a kick out the fact that the following, as with all spellchecks, would get by, even though "it's" is misused: The dog turned it's head.
Just a case of minor grammatical misinformation. :-)
>>>>You can always find the discussions (and others involving John or any of the other contributors) by simply clicking on their name where it is underlined in the Forum. That will list all posts made by that person and you can click on any of them to access their wise words.<<<<
I had forgotten that great feature, one of many on this forum. The spellcheck is welcome. I get a kick out the fact that the following, as with all spellchecks, would get by, even though "it's" is misused: The dog turned it's head.
I am being treated by the prostate-specialist team at Guys and St Thomas's hospital in London. This is one of the places that's involved with the latest developments in this field. I'm 49, and I was diagnosed a couple of years ago. Because of what was found from biopses and other investigative work the team felt that Active Surveillance (AS) was a perfectly sensible option to discuss. I'm tested regularly (which is what 'active surveillance' implies), and if/when the situation changes we'll revisit the options and make a decision then.
Point to note: current expert thinking, by leaders in the field, is that physical intervention is NOT automatically a must in anyone with this disease who's not at retirement age.
This doesn't mean that AS is right for every incidence of prostate cancer. But it DOES mean that AS is not automatically WRONG just because someone's the sunny side of 70.
It's something that should be discussed with medical experts who've reviewed your details, and remember that this cancer is typically less lethargic in younger sufferers than older guys; if you're diagnosed after 70 the odds are high that you'll die of something else.
Me, I'm under 50. But world-class experts in this field have said they're very happy to suggest AS to me as a sensible option among other choices, and they were very happy to support me in choosing AS. All the intervention methods carry various forms and levels of risk, many of which can be significantly life-altering. If they're needed, they're needed. But I was told that there has been as much as 50% over-treatment of this disease. I'll keep watching and cross that bridge when it seems more necessary.
