Erleada for treating prostate cancer

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved Erleada (apalutamide), a next-generation androgen receptor inhibitor for the treatment of patients with non-metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. Erleada is a prescription medicine used to treat prostate cancer that has not spread to other parts of the body and no longer responds to a medical or surgical treatment that lowers testosterone.

Before you start treatment, tell your healthcare provider about all your medical conditions, including if you have a history of seizures, brain injury, stroke, or brain tumors. If you have a partner who is pregnant or may become pregnant. Men who are sexually active with a pregnant woman must use a condom during and for three months after treatment.

Erleada treatment can cause bones and muscles to weaken and may increase risk for falls and fractures. Falls and fractures have happened in people during treatment with Erleada. Falls were not caused by loss of consciousness (fainting) or seizures. Your healthcare provider will monitor your risks for falls and fractures during treatment.

Seizure-if you take Erleada, you may be at risk of having a seizure. You should avoid activities where a sudden loss of consciousness could cause serious harm. Tell your healthcare provider right away if you have a loss of consciousness or seizure. Your healthcare provider will stop Erleada if you have a seizure during treatment.

The most common side effects include:feeling very tired, high blood pressure, rash, diarrhea, nausea, decreased appetite, weight loss, joint pain, fall, hot flash, bone injury (fracture), swollen hands, ankles and feet. Erleada may cause fertility problems.
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Changes in fat metabolism increases the risk of prostate cancer metastasis

Nature Communications, researchers at the Cancer Center at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) shed new light on the genetic mechanisms that promote metastasis in the mouse model and also implicated the typical Western high-fat diet as a key environmental factor driving metastasis. Although it is widely postulated that a Western diet can promote prostate cancer progression, direct evidence supporting a strong association between dietary lipids and prostate cancer has not been considered.

Epidemiological data links dietary fats (and obesity) to many types of cancer, and rates of cancer deaths from metastatic cancers including prostate cancer. The progression of cancer to the metastatic stage represents a pivotal event that influences patient outcomes and the therapeutic options available to patients. Available data provide a strong genetic foundation for the mechanisms underlying metastatic progression, and also demonstrated how environmental factors can boost these mechanisms to promote progression from primary to advanced metastatic cancer.

The tumor suppressor gene PTEN is known to play a major role in prostate cancer; its partial loss occurs in up to 70 percent of primary prostate tumors. Its complete loss is linked to metastatic prostate disease, but animal studies suggest the loss of PTEN alone is not enough to trigger progression. Pandolfi and colleagues sought to identify an additional tumor suppressing gene or pathway that may work in concert with PTEN to drive metastasis.

Looking at recent genomic data, Pandolfi and colleagues noticed that another tumor suppressor gene, called PML, tended to be present in localized (non-metastatic) prostate tumors, but was absent in about a third of metastatic prostate tumors. Moreover, about 20 percent of metastatic prostate tumors lack both PML and PTEN. When they compared the two types of tumor - the localized ones lacking only the PTEN gene versus the metastatic tumors lacking both genes - the researchers found that the metastatic tumors produced huge amounts of lipids, or fats.

 In tumors that lacked both PTEN and PML tumor suppressing genes, the cells' fat-production machinery was running amok.  Discovered in 2009, a molecule named "fatostatin" is currently being investigated for the treatment of obesity. Pandolfi and colleagues tested the molecule in lab mice. The obesity drug blocked the lipogenesis fantastically and the tumors regressed and didn't metastasize.

In addition to opening the door to new treatment for metastatic prostate cancer, these findings also solve a long-standing scientific puzzle. For years, researchers had difficulty modeling metastatic prostate cancer in mice, making it hard to study the disease in the lab. Mice are fed with saturated fat, the type found in food cheeseburgers and fries - in the animals' diet, the mice developed aggressive, metastatic tumors.

The findings could result in more accurate and predictive mouse models for metastatic prostate cancer, which in turn could accelerate discovery of better therapies for the disease. Additionally, physicians could soon be able to screen their early-stage prostate cancer patients for those whose tumors lack both PTEN and PML tumor suppressing genes, putting them at increased risk for progressing to metastatic disease. These patients may be helped by starving these tumors of fat either with the fat-blocking drug or through diet.
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Mediterranean diet can prevent prostate cancer

Men who followed a Mediterranean diet, rich in fish, boiled potatoes, whole fruits, vegetables, legumes, and olive oil, and low consumption of juices had lower risk of aggressive prostate cancer PC than those who followed other dietary patterns like Prudent or Western diets.  PC is the most common type of cancer in men and can have a high mortality rate, evidence linking PC to specific environmental, occupational, or dietary exposures has been limited. Recent studies have investigated whether certain dietary patterns impact cancer risks, but the results have been inconsistent.

"This study adds important evidence to the scarce information regarding the association of diet with PC, and highlights the relevance of focusing on global dietary patterns," explained lead investigator Beatriz Perez-Gomez, PhD, Cancer and Environmental Epidemiology Unit, National Center for Epidemiology, Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Madrid). Diet oriented towards the prevention of aggressive tumors in the prostate should include important elements of the Mediterranean diet such as fish, legumes, and olive oil, high intake of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.

The authors explored the relationship between the risk of having PC and dietary patterns as part of the MCC-Spain study, a Spanish case-control study that involved 733 patients with histologically confirmed PC and 1,229 healthy men with a mean age of 66 years from seven Spanish regions. Anthropometric, epidemiologic, and dietary data were collected.

Adherence to the three dietary patterns of Western, Prudent, and Mediterranean, which characterize the dietary habits of the Spanish population, was evaluated, The Western pattern includes consumption of large amounts of fatty dairy products, refined grains, processed meat, caloric beverages, sweets, fast food, and sauces.

 The Prudent pattern involves consumption of low-fat dairy products, whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and juices. Finally, the Mediterranean pattern consists of high consumption of fish, boiled potatoes, fruits, vegetables, legumes, and olive oil, and low consumption of juices. The diets were graded according to the degree of adherence to each pattern and assigned to four quartiles from lower to higher adherence within each pattern.

Only a high adherence to Mediterranean dietary pattern appeared to be associated with a lower risk of aggressive PC. Prudent and Mediterranean dietary patterns showed different effects in low and high grade tumors. PC was assessed using Gleason scores of tumor aggressiveness (<6 or ?6) and clinical stage (cT1b to cT4). A Gleason score of <6 typically indicates a less aggressive tumor with generally good prognosis.

 Lower clinical stage (cT1-cT2a) indicates a tumor that has not spread. Results indicated that for more aggressive and more extensive tumors (Gleason >6 and stages cT2b to cT4), only high adherence to the Mediterranean diet showed a statistically significant protective effect. All other dietary patterns and tumor characteristics showed little or no correlation and did not achieve statistical significance.

There is a contrast between the relevance of prostate cancer in terms of public health and the evidence regarding its primary prevention. If other researchers confirm these results, the promotion of the Mediterranean dietary pattern might be an efficient way of reducing the risk of developing advanced PC, in addition to lowering the risk of other prevalent health problems in men such as cardiovascular disease. Dietary recommendations should take into account whole patterns instead of focusing on individual foods.
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How weather increases the risk of cancer

Living in a cold climate could make people more likely to get cancer, people are at greater risk in colder countries because of their genes. The same genes which stop human cells from dying in freezing temperatures are also linked to breast and bowel cancer and leukaemia. A researcher says the genes contributing to cooler climates are the same which increase the risk of malignant tumours forming in the body.

Genetic variants found to be beneficial in extreme environments, can also predispose for cancer. Cell resistance at low temperatures and at high altitude probably increases the probability for malignancy.’Previous research from 2010 found grim weather in northern parts of the world may make men more vulnerable to prostate cancer, perhaps due to a lack of vitamin D from the sun.

However the new study - which compared international rates of cancer with 240 genetic studies of cancer and seven others in cold and high-altitude countries - suggests where people live affects their genes.Extreme cold weather can cause human cells to die, so that people in freezing countries have genetic mutations to prevent cell death and repair DNA.
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Low testosterone levels reduces the risk of prostate cancer

Men with low testosterone may not develop prostate cancer. Reducing testosterone hormone could reduce the risk of the cancer. Scientists who examined different men discovered that those with the lowest testosterone levels were 20 per cent less likely to get the cancer.

One in eight men will develop prostate cancer, with approximately 46,700 cases a year. But little is known about what causes the disease, unlike most cancers, it does not seem to be linked to obesity, exercise, smoking or alcohol.

Prostate cancer tumours need testosterone to grow, men with lower levels are less likely to get the illness. Reducing the levels of testosterone could unravel ways to diagnose and treat fatal prostate cancers before they can do any harm.
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New method of testing prostate cancer

Prostate cancer occurs in the prostate, it
is one of the most common types of cancer in men. Common symptoms are painful urination, decreased force in the stream of urine, blood in semen, pelvic pain and erectile dysfunction.

An easy to produce prostate cancer tracer, a substance vital for the discovery of cancers, has been developed, it is called 68 Ga-THP-PSMA, the new tracer, which was developed with support from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Biomedical Research.

Tracers are radioactive dyes that are introduced, by injection or in liquid form, into a patient's body before they have a positron emission tomography PET scan. As the tracer works its way around the body, organs and tissues affected by diseases such as cancer may absorb a higher or lower amount of the tracer than healthy tissues.

The level of absorption can be detected by the scan and help specialists to detect the disease. The tracer can give more patients access to potentially lifesaving scans by producing result quickly and leads to early treatment of the cancer.
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Higher levels of growth hormones increases risk of prostate cancer

Tall and overweight men are at the risk of developing prostate cancer. A six foot tall man has a 21 per cent risk of prostate cancer than a man who is five feet because tall men have higher levels of growth hormones.

Putting on weight around the middle changes testosterone levels, which may also lead to cancer. Higher body mass index (BMI) or waist circumference also increases the risk of prostate cancer.

Overweight men have high insulin levels in their blood, which is linked to prostate cancer. Larger prostate in tall men and the growth hormones which made them tall increase the risk of the cancer.

Healthy diets, regular physical activities, regular ejaculation, regular medical checks and healthy lifestyle can reduce the risk of prostate cancer irrespective of a man's height.
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Regular ejaculation reduces risk of prostate cancer

Regular ejaculation reduces risk of prostate cancer because it prevents inflammation, removes cancer-causing substances and infections.

Researchers examined sexual activities of different men for more than ten years and the results revealed that ejaculating regularly reduces the risk of prostate cancer in men.

Active sex life, healthy diet, regular exercise, 7 hours of sleep, healthy lifestyle and regular medical examination can reduce risk of developing prostate cancer.
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Symptoms of prostate cancer

The uncontrollable growth of cells in the prostate gland is prostate cancer, it is easy to treat if it is discovered early.

Common symptoms are: frequent urination at night, straining while urinating and back ache.

The most common way to diagnose abnormalities with the prostate gland is through a Prostate Specific Antigen, or PSA test.

PSA is a protein produced by the prostate and released into the blood stream in very small quantities.

More PSA is released when there is a problem with the prostate, and elevated levels can indicate prostatitis, enlarged prostate or prostate cancer.