Exercise and Prostate Cancer; Enzalutamide Extends Survival; and, Synergy in Cancer Risk Assessment.

Several articles of interest were recently published in the February-March, 2014 NewsPulse from the Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF). This information had been presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) meeting. The first article described the benefits of exercise in men prior to their prostate cancer diagnosis as well as during therapy for their condition.  A second article cited a new study involving 1700 men who received a new, oral hormone therapy drug, enzalutamide. The treatment increased survival by 29% and delayed disease progression by 81% in men with advanced prostate cancer who had become resistant to standard hormonal therapies and who had not received previous chemotherapy. In 2012, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had approved enzalutamide for use in prostate cancer patients who had received prior chemotherapy. Enzalutamide is a type of hormonal therapy that blocks the androgen (male hormone) receptor on cells. In addition, treatment with enzalutamide delayed the need for chemotherapy by 17 months.  A third article described  how combining clinical information from the CAPRA score with the genetic information expressed in either of the Oncotype DX or Prolaris assays yielded improved prostate cancer risk assessment and reduced overtreatment. These results were better than results achieved with either clinical or genetic information alone. A CAPRA score is a means to predict whether a patient has low, intermediate, or high risk prostate cancer; the scores generated are used to guide treatment decisions. CAPRA scores integrate PSA levels, Gleason score, clinical T stage, patient age, and the percentage of prostate biopsy tissue containing malignant cells. This methodology is 80% accurate in predicting the likelihood of progression to fatal disease.