repeated aggressive TURPs

[myprostate]

A medical writer some years ago recommended repeated aggressive TURPs for reducing tumor size after prostate cancer diagnosis .  This was to be a way to avoid the perils of prostate removal or ablation, and while not curing the cancer at least extending the time before metastasis.  It made sense if tumor volume in itself mattered.  Is this recommendation still kicking around?

[myprostate]

Thank you Dr. Tewari, but for some men the risks attendant to radical prostatectomy are unthinkable.  These men opt for likely shorter lives with assurance, for a few years, of highest quality.  
The idea of "repeated aggressive TURPs" as cancer treatment was presented by Dr. L.P. Sonda in "Second-look prostate resection for incidental carcinoma of the prostate" in Altwein JE, Faul P, Schneider W. (eds.) "Incidental Carcinoma of the Prostate", Springer-Verlag, Berlin,1991, pp.109-13.  If Dr. Sonda's idea works at all, it would appeal to the class of men mentioned.  The idea should have been confirmed or disconfirmed by now.  Does your reply mean that Dr. Sonda's idea was disconfirmed or only that the strategy of a whole class of men with prostate cancer is disdained.

[Ash Tewari, MD, M.Ch.]

Thank you for your question. TURP is generally used for men who have BPH. The operation can be used in men with prostate cancer who cannot undergo radical prostatectomy before another treatment begins. In the era of early detection, this is often not the case and primary treatment involves radical prostatectomy, robotic or otherwise.

Ash Tewari, MD

http://www.cornellroboticprostate.org

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