jivan

[jivan]

my father is 79 year old male with prostate cancer.went through radiation therapy,also had 3 lupron shot every 3 months last yaer.his psa was 0.after all these treatments.Currently he is not taking any medicaion,but unfortunatly he broke his hip and had a surgery,everything went well except his psa is now 6.is it possible that this has something to do with surgery?

[sonu78]

Hi,
Your father seems to have either recurrence of the tumour or some metastatic deposit.
The pelvic/?hip fracture you have mentioned could be due to secondaries in the bone leading to pathological fracture.
At this stage it would be advisable to have him examined by the urologist who had previously operated upon him and subject him for few investigations.

[riley180]

Hi. Its not likely to be part of the hip surgery, unless there was some injury to the prostate. If the PSA is 6, this raises suspicion that there may be return of the cancer. The fracture may also be a manifestation of bone involvement of the cancer (although it is hard to separate his other risks for fracture: his age of 79, with previous radiation, and hormone therapy). If the surgery was done, it is not likely that the fracture is due to the cancer because, the surgeon would not proceed with diseased bone.
Going back to the PSA elevation, this is a stage called "biochemical recurrence", this is because the only evidence of disease may be only this manifestation(imaging studies may not see a new focus of cancer, because it is too small to be detected with current means). There is no clear relationship between deterioration and biochemical recurrence, you will need to make a decision whether to go for some more treatment (which would likely be hormones - the risk of another will be there though it is likely, the radiation may have played an additive role) or to observe for any other manifestations of disease and then intervene as these come.
Discuss with your doctor these concerns.