A new study raises questions about whether surgery for early-stage prostate cancer is really necessary — or even advisable. This particular surgery, which often leaves men impotent or incontinent, does not appear to save the lives of those newly diagnosed with the disease, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The study concludes that many men with early-stage prostate cancer would do just as well to choose no treatment at all. A report on the study was carried in the New York Times.
The findings were based on the largest-ever clinical trial comparing surgical removal of the prostate with a strategy known as “watchful waiting.” They add to growing concerns that prostate cancer detection and treatment efforts over the past 25 years, particularly in the United States, have been woefully misguided, rendering millions of men impotent, incontinent and saddled with fear about a disease that was unlikely ever to kill them in the first place. About 100,000 to 120,000 radical prostatectomy surgeries are performed in the United States every year.