Older men need to be alert to prostate cancer in the bones

At present, with the aging of my country's population, prostate disease has become an increasingly obvious problem that troubles the lives of the majority of elderly men. In addition to the most common benign prostatic hyperplasia, prostate cancer has become a health killer for elderly men and has also become the focus of everyone's attention.

In the United States, prostate cancer ranks second in deaths caused by malignant tumors. In my country, with the increase in average age and the widespread use of detection methods such as blood PSA, the incidence of this tumor is also increasing year by year. However, due to its unique biological properties and anatomical location, the early symptoms of prostate cancer are not obvious. When patients come to the doctor due to symptoms, they are already in the late stage. Moreover, prostate cancer and prostatic hyperplasia can exist at the same time. Therefore, some patients first notice symptoms of metastases (most commonly bones) rather than prostate problems, which leads to Mr. Gu's situation mentioned above.

In addition to lymph node metastasis, the most common metastatic sites of prostate cancer are bones throughout the body, mainly the pelvis, lumbar spine, sacrum, thoracic spine, and ribs. Most of these metastatic lesions are osteoblastic changes, and there may also be mixed osteolytic changes. Among them, metastatic lesions in the thoracic and lumbar spine may compress the spinal nerves, causing limb movement disorders in patients. These bone metastases will eventually cause bone pain in the corresponding parts, and even pathological fractures.

Everyone knows that tumors must be detected and treated early. However, how do we detect prostate cancer, a tumor that cannot be seen or touched from the outside of the body?

We should pay attention to the symptoms of the primary lesion (prostate area) and cannot simply explain everything by prostate hyperplasia, which is common in the elderly. Necessary examinations are indispensable.

More attention should be paid to the symptoms of metastatic lesions, especially multiple lesions on irregular bones such as the pelvis and spine, which should alert people to the possibility of bone metastasis of prostate cancer.

We need to increase the intensity of screening and census. For older men, especially those over 50 years old, blood PSA and anorectal digital examination are necessary physical examination items.

It is also important to remind you that once prostate cancer with bone metastasis is found, there is no need to panic. Although surgery is no longer possible to eradicate the lesion, due to the biological characteristics of prostate cancer, its development is relatively slow, and current endocrine therapy is effective for most advanced prostate cancers, and there are reports of long-term survival. Even if some patients have poor endocrine therapy effects, there are also a variety of comprehensive treatments such as radiotherapy, chemotherapy, and isotopes to choose from, which can alleviate and stabilize the patient's condition, thereby prolonging the patient's survival.