Rising PSA Two Years Into HT

User

Posted 24 Nov 2023 at 15:14

Hi,

I am two years into Zoladex hormone therapy scheduled to run for another year. Last year I had six cycles of chemo and 37 fractions of radiotherapy for my locally advanced PC. While still fairly low, 0.5 - 0.9, the latest PSA test showed the trend is continuing upwards. I also had my testosterone tested and this showed that my testosterone is 'continuing to be suppressed'. My oncologist is arranging another PET scan to investigate further.

Has anyone else experienced rising PSA levels whilst on HT?

User

Posted 25 Nov 2023 at 08:18

I have little knowledge of prostate cancer. But as my dh has been put on lifelong hormone therapy due to cancer return 9 years after treatment I did some research about HT. I have read it works at reducing the cancer for most people and can work for anything from 4 months up to ten years plus, eventually the cancer will start to wake up anyway, this is called castrate resistant. This may be the case for you or it may be something else causing the rise. There are other things you can do instead so it’s good you are having a pet scan to investigate.

User

Posted 25 Nov 2023 at 08:31

This suggests you have some cancer which is still growing and has become castrate resistant. If you had chemo to start with, that suggests the cancer had spread to your lymph nodes at that point.

It could be that this growing cancer is outside the radiotherapy treatment area, but the PET scan will hopefully show where it is, and it might be eligible for targeted radiotherapy.

User

Posted 25 Nov 2023 at 11:19

Thanks for the responses, Wiosal, and Andy62.

It looks like my new PET scan is scheduled in about three weeks' time and I am to have another consultation with my oncologist shortly afterward to decide on a plan of action. My post-chemo MRI scan showed that the PC had shrunk 'considerably' both in the prostate and surrounding area which makes the most recent PSA test result puzzling. The latest was 1.25. My PC was initially diagnosed as aggressive - Gleason 9 - so I am more than half expecting the scan to show that the chemo and radiation did not get it all the last time around.

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