Study tracks long-term side effects following therapy

Posted: Wednesday, February 6, 2013 8:00 pm

A new study comparing outcomes among prostate cancer patients treated with surgery versus radiotherapy found differences in urinary, bowel and sexual function after short-term follow-up, but those differences were no longer significant 15 years after initial treatment.
The study, led by first author Matthew Resnick, M.D., instructor in Urologic Surgery, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, was published in the Jan. 31 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
From Oct. 1, 1994, through Oct. 31, 1995, investigators enrolled men who had been diagnosed with localized prostate cancer in the Prostate Cancer Outcomes Study (PCOS).
For the current study, investigators followed 1,655 men between the ages of 55 and 74 from the PCOS group, of whom 1,164 (70.3 percent) had undergone prostatectomy, while 491 (29.7 percent) had undergone radiotherapy. At the time of enrollment, the patients were asked to complete a survey about clinical and demographic issues and health-related quality of life. The men were contacted again at set times following treatment and were asked about clinical outcomes and disease-specific quality of life issues.
Men whose prostates had been surgically removed were significantly more likely than those who received radiation therapy to report urinary leakage at two years and five years. However, at 15 years, the investigators found no significant difference in the adjusted odds of urinary incontinence. Nonetheless, patients in the surgery group were more likely to wear incontinence pads throughout the 15-year follow-up period.
Men in the prostatectomy group were also significantly more likely than those in the radiotherapy group to report having problems with erectile dysfunction two years and five years after surgery.
“At the two- and five-year time points, men who underwent prostatectomy were more likely to suffer from urinary incontinence and erectile dysfunction than men who received radiation therapy,” explained Resnick.
“While treatment-related differences were significant in the early years following treatment, those differences became far less pronounced over time.”
Despite early and intermediate-term data revealing treatment-dependent differences in patterns of sexual dysfunction, after five years both groups had a gradual decline in sexual function.
At 15 years, erectile dysfunction was nearly universal with 87 percent in the prostatectomy group and 93.9 percent in the radiotherapy group reporting sexual difficulties.

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