About the Prostate

The prostate is a small gland about the size of a golf ball. It is found only in men. It sits just below the bladder and surrounds part of the urethra. The prostate produces some of the fluid that makes up semen.
The growth of the prostate depends on the male sex hormone, testosterone, which is [...]

Prostate Disease

What is prostate disease?
Prostate disease is a very common health problem for men. Prostate disease is a term used to describe any medical problems involving the prostate gland. Not all prostate disease is cancer.
Typical prostate problems experienced by men include:
•Prostatitis which is inflammation or swelling of the prostate gland
•Benign prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) which is a [...]

Prostate Cancer

Prostate cancer is diagnosed mainly in men over the age of 50 years. Excluding some forms of skin cancer, prostate cancer is the most common type of cancer in Australian men. Prostate cancer is a condition in which cells within the prostate grow and divide abnormally so that a tumour grows in the prostate.
Prostate cancer [...]

Risk Factors

The causes of prostate cancer are not known. However there are certain risk factors that have been linked with the development of prostate cancer including:
•  Family history of prostate cancer- those men with a father or brother who has had prostate cancer
•  Age- men over the age of 50 years
•  Diet- a diet high in [...]

Symptoms

Early prostate cancer usually causes no symptoms. Many men over fifty have urinary symptoms such as:
• a need to pass urine more often, especially at night
• difficulty starting
• difficulty holding back the flow
• not being able to urinate when you feel you need to
• poor urine flow or a flow that stops and starts
• painful ejaculation
• decreased [...]

Testing

How prostate cancer is diagnosed
If your doctor thinks you might have prostate cancer, a number of tests can be done to find out for certain. These tests will also check the size of the cancer and find out if it has spread. It is important that you understand what it will mean if a test [...]

Treatment

The type of treatment will depend on a number of factors. These include:
• The stage of the cancer- localized in the prostate gland or spread to other parts of the body
• The Gleason score- high (more aggressive) or low grade biopsy grading
• The level of PSA in the blood stream
• The man’s age
• The man’s general medical health
• The side-effects of [...]

Statistics

The stats on Prostate Cancer are 20,000 cases diagnosed with 3,300 deaths annually.

Personal Stories

Stan Norman
The first time I had really known anything about prostate cancer was following our move from Doncaster to Anglesea during 2001. The home we purchased was situated two doors up from Ted (jnr) and Pam Whitten and it was meeting these two wonderful people that, indirectly, probably saved my life.
Having no previous experience with [...]

FURTHER INFORMATION

For further information on prostate cancer, please contact
Andrology Australia
c/- Monash Institute of Medical Research
Monash Medical Centre
246 Clayton Road
Clayton, VIC 3168
Phone: 1300 303 878
Fax: 03 9594 7111
Email: info@andrologyaustralia.org
Website: www.andrologyaustralia.org