Men’s Health Blog

Helpline support by telephone and e-mail is offered to men with prostate cancer, wives, partners and families, people who are concerned, and those who want to know more.

Helpline support is given by volunteers who have themselves been affected by prostate cancer. Through the helpline you can be put in touch with contacts who have personal experience of the main treatments and stages of prostate cancer.

Telephone Helpline: 0845 6010766 (UK LOCAL CALL RATES APPLY)

E-Mail Support: helpline@prostatecancersupport.info

CambsPSA
Cambridgeshire Prostate Cancer Support Association
(Patron: Professor David E Neal)

Providing support and information for all those affected by prostate cancer

CambsPSA offers help, information and support to all those affected by prostate cancer through a:

i)   National Prostate Cancer Helpline

ii)  Useful links

iii) Information pack

iv) Read our “Hit below the belt” leaflet (PDF, 48kb)

CambsPSA has been set up by a small group of prostate cancer patients based mainly in East Anglia.

It is managed by and for men with prostate cancer, their families and those who are interested in improving the care and support of those affected by this form of cancer.

Our services are free of charge to anyone and are funded entirely by membership subscriptions and donations.

CambsPSA is a registered charity (Registered Charity Number : 1133410). The Trustees who are responsible for CambsPSA are elected at the Annual General Meeting, to which all members are invited.

CambsPSA does not offer or give advice, only information and support. Those seeking professional advice should consult a qualified practitioner.

Behavioral therapy may help with incontinence associated with prostate cancer surgery say researchers in a study published January 12, 2011 in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The researchers studied 208 men aged 51 through 84 years with incontinence lasting 1 to 17 years after prostate cancer surgery was conducted at a university and 2 Veterans Affairs continence clinics  between 2003-2008 and included a 1-year follow-up after active treatment. 

The participants were classified by type and frequency of incontinence, and then were randomly selected to participate in 1 of 3 groups:

• 8 weeks of behavioral therapy (pelvic floor muscle training and bladder control strategies)
• behavioral therapy plus in-office, dual-channel electromyograph biofeedback and daily home pelvic floor electrical stimulation at 20 Hz, current (referred to in the study as behavior plus)
• delayed treatment, which served as the control group

Here’s what the researchers observed:

• Average incontinence episodes decreased from 28 to 13 per week  after behavioral therapy and from 26 to 12 after behavior plus therapy
• Both reductions were significantly greater than the reduction from 25 to 21 per week for the control group 
• There was no significant difference in incontinence reduction between the treatment groups 
• Improvements lasted for 12 months in the active treatment groups: 50 percent reduction in the behavioral group and 59 percent reduction in the behavior plus group

I hear you laugh! ‚What a question!’ you may call out. However, there are many answers when you thin

Fat is an essential to our human body, but it must be in an essential form. We are consuming  non-essential fatty acids in our day to day life, which is called Bad Fat. If you remove all the fat from your body you will die immediately. your cell membranes and nervous system would collapse.

Role of FAT :-

• Boost the immune system
• Slow down release of sugar in blood stream
• Absorption of vitamins
• Form cell membrane

All the Fats we consume are two different types. Fatty acids are essential, they are called Omega 3 and Omega 6. Omega 3 (alphalinoeic acid) found in walnut, pumpkin, Soy.   Omega 6 (linoeic acid) found in vegetable oils, grains, beans.

Omega 3 fatty acids present in vegetables require large time for absorption, when compared for animal fatty acid. Omega 3 and Omega 6 is good for human body. it should be 1:5 ratio, but we are consuming 1: 30.Since Omega 6 present in many compounds which we are using in our day to day life. In order to supply Omega 3 to our body, we must take it as a supplement.

Salmon Omega 3 is a product given by Nutrilite. It combines fish oil (Salmon fish harvested from the deep cold water of Atlantic ocean) With D-Alpha Tocopherol to give you a balanced formula of good fats without fish taste.

Componants : Each soft gel contains Eicosa Pentaenoic Acid (EPA) and Docosa Hexaenoic Acid (DHA) is most active form which can be easily used by the body.

How it Works :-

• changes in cell
• body bulge,hair loss
• infertility,capillary resistance
• delayed wound healing

CONTROLS:

• cancer-breast,prostate,collon
• heart diseases
• nerve signal transmission
• premature ageing
• blood pressure
• rheumatism
• obesity,depression
• absorbs fat soluble vitamins
• immune booster
• it controls high triglyceride level

For further details, send an email to nutritionhealthly@gmail.com

 

 

I have learned through trial and error, mostly error, to avoid wearing overly unique shoes to work. Sure, my nifty boots or beat-up Chucks might make my personality stand out on certain days, but there are times I’d rather not stand out, particularly when I’m sitting down.
Read the rest of this entry »

Last year British researchers reported new confirmative findings for a link between index finger length (relative to ring finger length) and the risk of developing prostate cancer. Men featured with a longer index finger than ring finger, appear to have a 33% higher chance for not developing prostate cancer.

Often such studies are qualified by non-experts as “nonsense” – initially because of the association with classical palmistry. Usually a main argument of concern is the seize of the studied sample: many ’2D:4D digit ratio’ studies have been focused relatively small samples, and usually with the statistics were simly not strong enough to be applied to individuals. But those arguments can not be used to the describe the new British study!

The new British research involves a study where the hands of 1,524 prostate cancer patients were examined, which were compared with a control group of 3,044 men.

It can also be noted that Professor John Manning described in his second book ‘The Finger Book‘ with great details the suspected link between the ’2D:4D digit ratio’ and prostate cancer – a complex theory about of role glutamine chains in the sensitivity of hormone receptors, which in their turn play a role in the activation of testosterone in the body:

“…The various forms of the androgen receptor have important consequences for our health and behaviour. For example, African-American men have shorter glutamine chains (high sensitivity to testosterone) than white men. Short glutamine chains are associated with an increased susceptibility to prostate cancer, and this may in part explain why the incidence of prostate cancer is higher in African-Americans than in white Americans. …”

In short, there seems to exist a triangular relationship between: 1) the high percentage of prostate cancer in Americans with African ancestry, 2) the length of the glutamine chains, and 3) the length ratio between index finger and ring finger.

The importance of the new British study can be recognized in the fact the use of preventive screening for prostate cancer – which is anno 2010 usually done through the use of a blood test – is still an object of confusion. Simply because the benefits of the screening devices are still very unclear. Meanwhile it is a fact that prostate cancer is known as the No. 1 cause of death from cancer in men (see picture below).

Therfore finger length assessment can become a new tool in prostate cancer screeing!

The British researchers therefore are speculating about how to add a practical application of their finger length study to the traditional methods of prostate cancer prevention screening!

RELATED SOURCES:
• More finger length studies
• How to read your own palm!

Well here it is the final episode of my Prostate trilogy. Its been an epic writing journey for me as I don’t think I have written so much about 1 topic since College. I will recap just a bit but you can read the full stories here & here.

I first started with a story about how I became ill and it was discovered that I had an inflamed prostate and a UTI. The next step was to go to see a Urologist (which this post will cover). The second post was a complete breakdown of everything the normal person would need to know about their prostate, what it does, and how doctors diagnose issues with it. I think this second post was a huge success as we had a true professional give his expert opinion instead of just getting a bunch of stuff from the internets.

The Boyfriend I Never Wanted

So on with the show. We pick up the story 2 weeks after my UTI. The antibiotics had run their course and I was feeling normal again. I just had to get past this one visit and go on with my life. I met with my doctor who is highly respected in the St. Louis area. In fact there is a college with his Family’s name on it. I went over my symptoms with him and he had gotten a full write up on me from my primary care. We started with the “exam” and right away he noticed that my Prostate was still enlarged.  He also prescribed some blood work as my Prostate should have gone down in size over the past couple weeks with the infection.

Within a few days the blood results were back and my PSA level was at 4.5. Which at the time to me seemed low. My calmness was squashed in the matter of a second when I heard that for my age a PSA lower than 1 was more normal. I was then asked to come back into the office for some more testing and examining. The next test was still looking at my PSA but they wanted to know the Free:Bound ratio. Now for some reason I will never forget where I was when I received the info back from this test. It was St. Partick’s Day and I was celebrating my Irish Heritage at 10am and I think it was a Tuesday or something. I was well on my way to having a great day. Then my phone rang… The results came back with my Free PSA was at 3%. Which if you recall from Dr. Greenfield, the higher the Free PSA the better. My doctor advised that he likes to see around 20-25% Free PSA. What really makes this call really stick out in my head however, is it was the first time the “Cancer” word was mentioned. The timing was terrible.

With 2 strikes against me (Elevated PSA & Low Free PSA) my doctor was concerned. He gave another exam and the size had not gone down. He advised that the next step was to perform an ultrasound of my Prostate. He wanted to get a visual of the area, to see if there was some asymmetry and just try identify if something crazy was going on. The ultrasound was not the same as the one that was performed on my wife’s belly when she was pregnant either. In fact, to get a REALLY good look at it they had to dive in. This was the second most uncomfortable experience in my life. He looked around for what seemed like 3 hours took some pictures and went about his ANALysis. He identified some scar tissue that had been there from a previous infection (not the one I just had) and noticed my walnut was large and asymmetrical. Stirke 3.

With all the information gathered, there was but one choice (so I thought). My Doctor seemed almost certain that I had cancer. He even wrote a “Thank you” letter to my primary care. I don’t know if he was excited about the thought of a 30 year old with cancer or what… Anyway the biopsy was put on the calendar and my one visit to the Urologist had blown up into 4 visits, 2 rounds of blood work, 1 ultrasound, and now 1 biopsy.

As I said before the Ultrasound was the second most uncomfortable event in my life. The Biopsy remains number 1 and I really hope it doesn’t get trumped any time soon. If you are unfamiliar with a biopsy, they have to take small pieces of whatever is at risk, send them off to a lab, and check to see if there’s cancer. The Biopsy itself took I think about 30-45 min. They took 16 samples (4 from each region). It was painful and almost humiliating at the same time. When finished I thought the pain would be over, just a little pain here and there, nothing crazy. I was wrong. The rest of the day and the next I had to sit on one of those horseshoe-like pillows. Not to mention when I did business in the bathroom there was a lot of blood associated with it (from both ends). I will chalk that up to not asking about the side effects before i went in. Now with all the physical pain, there’s another interesting feeling going on, not knowing if you have cancer or not. That seemed to weigh on me as much as the pain.

To save the suspense, the bioposy results came back negative for cancer. Which was one of the greatest phone calls I’ve every received. So for the record, I didn’t want this to turn into a pity blog for me, I wanted to share this story with you to educate and hopefully make you a better patient. If I would have been armed with future goggles and Dr. Greenfield’s information, I don’t think I would have gone down this long painful path.

After talking with Dr. Greenfield and going over my history (with no exam +1), he has suggested that I possibly have Prostatitis, chronic swelling of the Prostate. Unfortunately, there is no real silver bullet for this and he did not suggest I take Avodart or Proscar as there are potential side effects that will hinder my baby making abilities. He suggested that I just live a healthy lifestyle, eat well, and exercise. I can live with that.

Thank you to everyone for taking some time to read this and a big thanks to Dr. Greenfield who took these posts to a new level. I hope my mission of providing you with some information & advice was successful. I think this will be the last post about wang for awhile. Til next time…

-S

AGEING PROCESS …. INSIGHTFUL !

WE all accept that getting older is inevitable, and now leading clinicians have revealed the exact age when different body parts start to decline, most alarming being the brain and lungs.

French doctors have found that the quality of men’s’ sperm starts to deteriorate by 35, so that by the time a man is 45 a third of pregnancies end in miscarriage.

Here, with the help of leading clinicians, Angela Epstein tells the ages when different parts of the body start to lose their battle with time.

BRAIN - Starts ageing at 20.
As we get older, the number of nerve cells – or neurons – in the brain decrease.
We start with around 100 billion, but in our 20s this number starts to decline.
By 40, we could be losing up to 10,000 per day, affecting memory, co-ordination and brain function.

GUT – Starts ageing at 55.
A healthy gut has a good balance between harmful and ‘friendly’ bacteria.
But, levels of friendly bacteria in the gut drop significantly after 55, particularly in the large intestine,says Tom MacDonald, Professor of Immunology at Barts and The London Medical School.
As a result, we suffer from poor digestion and an increased risk of gut disease.
Constipation is more likely as we age, as the flow of digestive juices from the stomach, liver, pancreas and small intestine slows down.

BREASTS – Start ageing at 35.
BY their mid-30s, women’s breasts start losing tissue and fat, reducing size and fullness.
Sagging starts properly at 40 and the areola (the area surrounding the nipple) can shrink considerably.

BLADDER - Starts ageing at 65.
Loss of bladder control is more likely when you hit 65.
Women are more vulnerable to bladder problems as, after the menopause, declining estrogen levels make tissues in the urethra – the tube through which urine passes – thinner and weaker, reducing bladder support.
Bladder capacity in an older adult generally is about half that of a younger person – about two cups in a 30-year-old and one cup in a 70-year-old. ….

LUNGS - Start ageing at 20.
Lung capacity slowly starts to decrease from the age of 20.
By the age of 40, some people are already experiencing breathlessness.
This is partly because the muscles and the rib cage which control breathing stiffen up.

VOICE - Starts ageing at 65.
Our voices become quieter and hoarser with age.
The soft tissues in the voice box (larynx) weaken, affecting the pitch, loudness and quality of the voice.
A woman’s voice may become huskier and lower in pitch, whereas a man’s might become thinner and higher.

EYES - Start ageing at 40.
Glasses are the norm for many over-40s as failing eyesight kicks in – usually long-sightedness, affecting our ability to see objects up close.

HEART - Starts ageing at 40.
The heart pumps blood less effectively around the body as we get older.
This is because blood vessels become less elastic, while arteries can harden or become blocked because of fatty deposits forming on the coronary arteries – caused by eating too much saturated fat.
The blood supply to the heart is then reduced, resulting in painful angina.
Men over 45 and women over 55 are at greater risk of a heart attack.

LIVER - Starts ageing at 70.
This is the only organ in the body which seems to defy the aging process.

KIDNEYS - Starts ageing at 50.
With kidneys, the number of filtering units (nephrons) that remove waste from the bloodstream starts to reduce in middle age.

PROSTATE - Starts ageing at 50.
The prostate often becomes enlarged with age, leading to problems such as increased need to urinate, says Professor Roger Kirby, director of the Prostate Centre in London .
This is known as benign prostatic hyperplasia and affects half of men over 50, but rarely those under 40.
It occurs when the prostate absorbs large amounts of the male sex hormone testosterone, which increases the growth of cells in the prostate.
A normal prostate is the size of a walnut, but the condition can increase this to the size of a tangerine.

BONES - Start ageing at 35.
‘Throughout our life, old bone is broken down by cells called osteoclasts and replaced by bone-building cells called osteoblasts – a process called bone turnover,’ explains Robert Moots, Professor of Rheumatology at Aintree University Hospital in Liverpool .
Children’s bone growth is rapid – the skeleton takes just two years to renew
Itself completely.
In adults, this can take ten years.
Until our mid-20s, bone density is still increasing.
But at 35 bone loss begins as part of the natural ageing process.

TEETH - Start ageing at 40.
As we age, we produce less saliva, which washes away bacteria, so teeth and gums are more vulnerable to decay. Receding gums – when tissue is lost from gums around the teeth – is common in adults over 40.

MUSCLES - Start ageing at 30.
Muscle is constantly being built up and broken down, a process which is well balanced in young adults.
However, by the time we’re 30, breakdown is greater than buildup, explains Professor Robert Moots.
Once adults reach 40, they start to lose between 0.5 and 02 per cent of their muscle each year.
Regular exercise can help prevent this.

HEARING - Starts ageing mid-50s.
More than half of people over 60 lose hearing because of their age, according to the Royal National Institute for the Deaf.

SKIN - Starts ageing mid-20s.
The skin starts to age naturally in your mid-20s.

TASTE AND SMELL - Start ageing at 60.
We start out in life with about 10,000 taste buds scattered on the tongue.
This number can halve later in life.
After we turn 60, taste and smell gradually decline, partly as a result of the normal ageing process.

FERTILITY - Starts ageing at 35.
Female fertility begins to decline after 35, as the number and quality of eggs in the ovaries start to fall.
The lining of the womb may become thinner, making it less likely for a fertilised egg to take, and also creating an environment hostile to sperm.

HAIR - Starts ageing at 30.
Male hair loss usually begins in the 30s. Hair is made in tiny pouches just under the skin’s surface, known as follices. A hair normally grows from each follicle for about three years, is then shed, and a new hair grows.
Most people will have some grey hair by the age of 35.
When we are young, our hair is coloured by the pigments produced by cells in the hair follicle known as melanocytes.