Prostate Cancer

For nearly a quarter-century, doctors have ordered annual PSA tests for men of a certain age to screen for prostate cancer, despite a lack of evidence that its benefits outweigh the risks - especially when tiny, slow-growing tumors were detected. But the landscape appears to be changing. While questions about PSA screening remain, physicians increasingly recognize the need to discuss both its harms and benefits with patients. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force shook up the status quo last July when it advised against using the simple blood test, which measures levels of a protein called prostate specific antigen, with average-risk men of any age who had no prostate cancer symptoms.

Robert Lee Lyles Jr., who had two careers in his 69 years and excelled at each, died May 27 at his home in Annapolis. A scientist, physician and state policy adviser, Dr. Lyles "was a modern renaissance man with a tremendous curiosity," said Gene Ransom, CEO of MedChi, the Maryland State Medical Society. In April, Dr. Lyles was honored by the Maryland Society of Anesthesiologists by having a scholarship created in his name, "established to support the efforts of MSA members to promote the specialty of anesthesiology and preserve the appropriateness and safety of the delivery of anesthesia in Maryland.

Robert Lee Lyles Jr., who had two careers in his 69 years and excelled at each, died May 27 at his home in Annapolis. A scientist, physician and state policy adviser, Dr. Lyles "was a modern renaissance man with a tremendous curiosity," said Gene Ransom, CEO of MedChi, the Maryland State Medical Society. In April, Dr. Lyles was honored by the Maryland Society of Anesthesiologists by having a scholarship created in his name, "established to support the efforts of MSA members to promote the specialty of anesthesiology and preserve the appropriateness and safety of the delivery of anesthesia in Maryland.

For nearly a quarter-century, doctors have ordered annual PSA tests for men of a certain age to screen for prostate cancer, despite a lack of evidence that its benefits outweigh the risks - especially when tiny, slow-growing tumors were detected. But the landscape appears to be changing. While questions about PSA screening remain, physicians increasingly recognize the need to discuss both its harms and benefits with patients. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force shook up the status quo last July when it advised against using the simple blood test, which measures levels of a protein called prostate specific antigen, with average-risk men of any age who had no prostate cancer symptoms.

Four years ago, doctors at Chesapeake Urology Associates started ordering the most expensive kind of prostate-cancer therapy for many more of their patients. Before 2007, the large, multi-office practice was prescribing the treatment, known as intensity modulated radiation therapy, for 12 percent of its prostate-cancer patients covered by Medicare, according to data compiled by a Georgetown University researcher. But starting in mid-2007, Chesapeake Urology's referral rate for IMRT more than tripled, rising to 43 percent of the Medicare cases.

For years, the PSA test has been the standard method for early detection of prostate cancer, which strikes one in six men. But recently, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a federal advisory panel, said the test that checks for prostate-specific antigens should not be routinely given to healthy men because it doesn't save enough lives to warrant all the extra treatment and stress stemming from the tests. Some men die of complications from surgery to remove the prostate, and many others suffer side effects.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins and the University of Michigan have discovered an inherited mutation linked to significantly higher risk of prostate cancer development at a younger age. The discovery, after two decades of looking, provides insight into the disease development. And though those with the mutation comprise just a fraction of the 240,000 new cases diagnosed annually, the discovery could also help doctors determine who needs earlier screening. The discovery is the first major genetic variant found for inherited prostate cancer, said Dr. Kathleen A. Cooney, professor of internal medicine and urology at the Michigan Medical School and a senior author of the study, which was published in the New England Journal of Medicine . The study found that those with a family history of prostate cancer were much more likely to have the mutation, and that gave them a 10-20 higher risk of developing the disease themselves.

Doctors are offering free screenings for prostate cancer from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. tomorrow and Friday in a mobile lab outside the Safeway at 2401 N. Charles St. The "Do it for Dad" drive against prostate cancer is sponsored by the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, the National Prostate Cancer Coalition and the Family Health Center of Baltimore. Doctors will conduct the two-part testing inside a 39-foot-long Airstream Land Yacht XL. It will include a blood test and a physical exam. Maryland ranks 10th in the nation in incidence of prostate cancer and in mortality.

A number of men in public life are talking publicly these days about their prostate cancer -- a disease that until recently few men wanted to discuss, and many agree the time for public airing is overdue.Details on Page 1C

Older men with early-stage prostate cancer may be better off waiting and having regular checkups and tests to monitor their cancer than having surgery or radiation therapy, says a new report.The study in yesterday's Journal of the American Medical Association is likely to stir controversy among doctors and the public about the effectiveness of surgery and radiation to treat prostate cancer, the most common kind of cancer among American men.Surgery and radiation for men older than 60 with early stages of prostate cancer may not help them live longer and may put them at risk for complications, particularly impotence and incontinence, which may "severely degrade quality of life," the study said.

Spring is the time of rebirth and renewal . For some, that means tee time and a chance to be outdoors, unwinding from the stresses of everyday life. If golf is your sport of choice, then you need to check out the Zero Prostate Cancer Golf Classic. This event takes place on May 13 from 10:30 a.m.-7 p.m. at the Towson Golf and Country Club, where LPGA tour players will join other golfers to help fight against prostate cancer. Founded by Chesapeake Urology Associates as the Great Prostate Cancer Challenge Baltimore Classic, this event raises funds to further research and provide free screenings in dozens of cities across the U.S. A Driving Range Clinic with the LPGA pros, plus a brunch, is from 10:30 a.m. until noon when a shotgun start begins the 18-hole adventure.

After Jon Spelman got the bad news, he found himself thinking often and at odd moments about "Moby-Dick. " Perhaps that's because the behemoth that was attacking the Baltimore storyteller was as submerged, unreasoning and unpredictable as any great white whale, and every bit as ferocious. Spelman knew that like Captain Ahab, the anti-hero of Herman Melville's novel, he would have to hunt his hunter. He armed himself not just with doctors and surgery and cancer-fighting drugs, but with wit, bravery and a determination to look straight at his own death - whenever it might come.

Otis R. "Damon" Harris Jr., a Baltimore singer who performed with the Temptations during the 1970s and later used his own diagnosis of prostate cancer to help raise awareness of the disease in African-American men, died Feb. 18 from the disease at Joseph Richey Hospice. The Owings Mills resident was 62. "Singing was his thing. When we were kids, his ambition was to be a singer for the Temptations. We did talent shows where we played Temps records and he'd sing," said Chuck Woodson, a cousin and broadcaster who recently retired as general manager of WFBR-AM 1590.

Baltimore native Otis "Damon" Harris, a one-time member of the legendary Motown act The Temptations, died on Monday after losing a 14-year-long battle to prostate cancer, according to family spokesman Chuck Woodson. Harris was 62. Harris, a resident of Owings Mills, died at the Joseph Richey Hospice in Seton Hill. Woodson said he was in remission until three years ago. The cancer had "gotten pretty bad" by the end of last summer, Woodson said, leaving Harris in the hospital from November until last week, when he was transferred to the hospice.

Barry Fitzpatrick, the principal of Mount St. Joseph High School, resigned Tuesday after officials there discovered "inappropriate" communications with students, the school said in a letter to parents. The school did not detail the content or the type of communications but said the "proper authorities" had been notified, school president George E. Andrews Jr. wrote in the letter obtained by The Baltimore Sun. Baltimore police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said he could neither confirm nor deny an investigation.

You see the jerseys every time the Orioles play at Camden Yards, often on boys born 20 years after the man shelved his famous mitt - No. 5. Robinson. The combination of that name and that number will always stir the souls of those who watched Brooks Robinson make impossible play after impossible play along the third-base line at Memorial Stadium. But even their children and grandchildren, who never glimpsed his magician's act, have heard the stories of Robinson's kindness - the way anybody could run into him at the mall and receive not only an autograph but a few minutes of genial conversation with a Hall of Famer.

Upper Chesapeake Medical Center will hold a Man to Man prostate cancer support group at 7 p.m. Wednesday in the Fallston Room. Men who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer are welcome, as well as their families. Information: 800-515-0044. Benefit health fair planned Quest Fitness in Abingdon will host a Charity Bazaar Health Fair to benefit The Arc Northern Chesapeake Region from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday. Guests will have the opportunity to work out for free using state-of-the-art strength and cardiovascular equipment.

Linking prostate cancer to a widespread industrial compound, scientists have found that exposure to a chemical that leaks from plastic causes genetic changes in animals' developing prostate glands that are precursors of the most common form of cancer in males. The chemical, bisphenol A or BPA, is used in the manufacture of the hard, polycarbonate plastic of baby bottles, microwave cookware and other consumer goods and has been detected in nearly every human body tested. Scientists and health experts have theorized for more than a decade that chemicals in the environment and consumer products mimic estrogens and may be contributing to male and female reproductive diseases, particularly prostate cancer.

For years, the PSA test has been the standard method for early detection of prostate cancer, which strikes one in six men. But recently, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a federal advisory panel, said the test that checks for prostate-specific antigens should not be routinely given to healthy men because it doesn't save enough lives to warrant all the extra treatment and stress stemming from the tests. Some men die of complications from surgery to remove the prostate, and many others suffer side effects.

William Warner Staley, a decorated Army Air Forces gunner during World War II who became a mechanical engineer, died of prostate cancer Monday at Pines Genesis Eldercare in Easton. The one-time Bolton Hill and Pasadena resident was 90. Born Warner McConnell Staley in Gibbstown, N.J., his name was changed when he was 10 to William Warner, to honor an ancestor who emigrated from the Cotswolds of England to Philadelphia in 1683. Raised in Haverford, Pa., he was a 1939 graduate of Lower Merion High School.