Best hormone treatment

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User

Posted 10 Sep 2025 at 19:10

We finally got to see an oncologist today after 10 weeks being on cancer pathway. My husband has been on Zoladex for 4 weeks. His Gleason score is 5+4.
the oncologist has said he will start on Apalatumide alongside Zoladex. Has anyone any experience of this? We did think we would be offered some options but we haven’t been. I have looked up Abiratone and wonder if anyone can shine a light on differences.

Thanks for reading.

User

Posted 10 Sep 2025 at 22:10

Safx, I went down the private health insurance route after surgery and salvage RT. In the private sector I was going to be on zoladex and abiraterone. For various reasons I transferred back to the NHS and I am on decapeptyl and apalutamide.

My NHS consultant said there wasn't enough evidence to say one was better than the other. When I pushed him and said what would you want your brother,father son etc too be on he said he would be happy for them to be on either and abi is not available in England for my situation anyway.

Now 5 months into decapeptyl and 4 months into apalutamide,the flushes and fatigue are an inconvenience, I did drop the apalutamide dose from 4 tablets to three ,that has helped so I might go back up to 4 tablets. It is what it is.

Thanks

User

Posted 11 Sep 2025 at 19:34

I wouldn't get too hung up on what might, or might not, be a theoretical 'best'. The only question is what works, and you will find out soon enough.

I started on Prostap , which failed, and was switched to Zoladex, which didn't .

Do make sure you get testosterone readings at each PSA test: it may give you an earlier warning of success/ failure that the PSA number, which can be a bit of a lagging indicator.

User

Posted 11 Sep 2025 at 20:09

Thanks for information. My husband has not had PSA tested since diagnosis but he is being called in for blood test before adding apalatumide to treatment. Is testosterone levels automatically checked at same time as PSA?

Sue

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