Your treatment depends on multiple factors, including your overall condition, if the cancer’s spread and how fast it’s spreading. Depending on your treatments, you may work with various healthcare providers, including urologists, radiation oncologists and medical oncologists. Most prostate cancer diagnosed in the early stages can be cured with treatment.

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Surveillance:

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Your healthcare provider may monitor your condition instead of providing treatment if your cancer grows slowly and doesn’t spread.

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Active surveillance:

 

You get screenings, scans and biopsies every one to three years to monitor cancer growth. Active surveillance works best if the cancer grows slowly, is only in your prostate and isn’t causing symptoms. If your condition worsens, your provider can start treatment.

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Watchful waiting: 

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Watchful waiting is similar to active surveillance, but it’s more commonly used for people who are frailer with cancer that likely won’t go away with treatment. Also, testing is much less frequent. Instead of eliminating the tumour, treatments usually focus on managing symptoms.

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Surgery:

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A radical prostatectomy removes a diseased prostate gland. It can often successfully eliminate prostate cancers that haven’t spread. Your provider can recommend the best removal method if they believe you’d benefit from this surgery.

• Robotic radical prostatectomy: Robotic radical prostatectomy allows your provider to perform surgery through several tiny incisions. Instead of operating directly, they operate a robot system via a console for more precision and improved outcomes. 

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Radiation therapy:

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You may receive radiation therapy as a standalone treatment for prostate cancer or in combination with other treatments. Radiation can also provide symptom relief.

• Brachytherapy: It involves placing radioactive seeds inside your prostate. This approach kills cancer cells while preserving surrounding healthy tissue.

• External beam radiation therapy: With external beam radiation therapy (EBRT), a machine delivers strong X-ray beams directly to the tumour. Specialized forms of EBRT, like IMRT, can direct high doses of radiation toward the tumour while sparing healthy tissue.

 

Systemic therapies:

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Your provider may recommend systemic therapies if cancer has spread outside your prostate gland. Systemic therapies send substances throughout your body to destroy cancer cells or prevent their growth.

• Hormone therapy: The hormone testosterone boosts cancer cell growth. Hormone therapy uses medications to combat testosterone’s role in cancer cell growth. The medication works by preventing testosterone from reaching cancer cells or by reducing your testosterone levels. Alternatively, your provider may recommend surgery to remove your testicles (orchiectomy) so they can no longer make testosterone. This surgery is an option for people who cannot afford expensive medication.

• Chemotherapy: Chemotherapy uses medicines to destroy cancer cells. You may receive chemotherapy alone or with hormone therapy if your cancer has spread beyond your prostate.

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Side effects of prostate cancer treatment:

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• Incontinence: You may leak urine when you cough or laugh or feel an urgent need to pass urine. This problem usually improves over the first few months provided you exercise the muscle controlling your bladder.

• Erectile dysfunction: Surgery, radiation and other treatments can damage the erectile nerves in your penis and affect your ability to get or maintain an erection. It’s common to regain erectile function within a year or two (sometimes sooner). In the meantime, medications like Viagra or Cialis can help by increasing blood flow to your penis.