My numbers/condition prior to treatment

I promised to post my pre-treatment numbers and condition. Here they are with explanations for what they mean.

PSA ("Prostate Specific Antigen"). My number is 3.8 before treatment. It started at 1.2 in 2000 and took 6 years to get to 3.3 when I had a biopsy and the cancerous cells were found. A rising PSA number is indicative of prostate problems, which may be cancer or a prostate infection ("prostatitis") or other possibilities. My PSA rose as high as 4.1. After reading The China Study, I went on a strict vegan diet for 3 months to see if my PSA would go down -- it did, to 3.6. I figured that a vegan diet would keep my PSA low but would not eliminate the cancer nor eliminate the possibility of a spread. Hence, treatment eventually. (I waited >2 years.) BUT, take a look at The China Study. Very, very powerful and convincing stuff. For diabetes, heart problems, breast cancer, prostate cancer, and more. The power of a vegan diet, plus lifestyle changes, was proven in a large study at UCSF by my doctor there, Peter Carroll, and Dean Ornish. Take a look at this article on that study: http://www.newsweek.com/id/141984 . If you are worried about these things for yourself or your children, read The China Study. From a website called "Dad Talk", here is a review written for the Los Angeles Times: http://dadtalk.typepad.com/dadtalk/2006/01/book_review_chi.html

Gleason Score. My number was 3+3 = 6. The Gleason score is taken from the cancerous biopsy samples. A pathologist looks at the cells under a microscope and grades them based on how they look. Remember your high school biology? Living cells may look like odd-shaped balls -- but they have well-defined edges. Well-defined edges is what you want. If the edges/boundaries of cells are broken, that is more likely a cancerous cell. And, the less well-defined they are, the more dangerous the cancer cell is and the more likely it is to travel to distant regions of your body. The Gleason score was established by Dr. Gleason in the 1960's just for prostate cancer. The smaller the number, the better. But, they hardly ever find cancer in scores less than 5 or 6 because of the very, very early nature of that type of cancer. There are also other scales for other types of cancer. Take a look at this website for a fuller description of the Gleason Score: http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Gleason+scale .

TNM Score. My TNM is T1c. The TNM scale consists of the following:

• "T" describes the tumor and uses different numbers to explain how large it is.
• "N" stands for nodes and tells whether the cancer has spread to the lymph nodes.
• "M" means metastatic, and tells whether the cancer has spread throughout the body.

I don't have either node or metastatic involvement so I don't have an N or M number.

The "T" score is further broken down as follows:

• Stage T1: Microscopic tumor confined to prostate and undetectable by a digital rectal exam (DRE) or ultrasound
• Stage T1a: Tumor found in 5% or less of prostate tissue sample
• Stage T1b: Tumor found in more than 5% of a prostate tissue sample
• Stage T1c: Tumor is identified by needle biopsy as a follow-up to screening that detected elevated PSA results
• Stage T2: Tumor confined to prostate and can be detected by DRE or ultrasound
• Stage T2a: Tumor involves less than half of one lobe of the prostate, and can usually be discovered during DRE exam
• Stage T2b: Tumor involves more than half of one lobe of the prostate, and can usually be felt during DRE exam
• Stage T2c: Tumor involves both lobes of the prostate and is felt during a DRE exam
• Stage T3: Tumor has spread to surrounding tissues or to the seminal vesicles
• Stage T3a: Tumor has spread to outside of the prostate on only one side Stage T3b: Tumor has spread to outside of the prostate on both sides
• Stage T3c: Tumor has spread to one or both of the seminal tubes
• Stage T4: Tumor is still within the pelvic region but may have spread to organs near the prostate, such as the bladder
• And so on into areas we don't want to go.

My numbers and scores are fairly run of the mill. Gleason 6 is very common for early prostate cancer. 3.

Here is more on prostate cancer scaling and grading: http://www.henryford.com/body.cfm?id=39165