Radical prostate cancer therapy rolled out

A REVOLUTIONARY new prostate treatment is being rolled out across the UK, with nine hospitals set to offer a non-invasive option to stop thousands of men being left with gruelling side effects from surgery.

Every year, up to 12,000 men with early-stage prostate cancer will receive the same invasive treatment as those with advanced cancer, which often leads to urinary and erectile dysfunction.

But a new therapy that uses high-focused beams of ultrasound (HIFU) or cryotherapy to target and treat the cancer, leaving surrounding organs and tissue unharmed, is to offer a new lifeline.

It coincides with the results of a 10-year study that found focal therapy can control cancer just as well as radical surgery. However, crucially, it has better lifestyle outcomes.

Professor Hashim Ahmed, chairman of Urology at Imperial College London, has been leading the UK’S focal therapy study. He said: “This research signals a huge breakthrough for focal therapy as we now have long-term data from a number of sectors, surgeons and hospitals across the UK.

“The treatment, which could be available for nearly 12,000 men diagnosed each year with intermediate grade cancer that has not spread outside of the prostate gland, is showing excellent outcomes for cancer control with better quality of life.

“Men have a right to be treated locally – this is a national health service.”