Zhao Pengcheng, Attending Physician, Department of Urology, Henan Cancer Hospital
Mr. Zhang, who is old, has been in good health, except for a little lumbar disc herniation and more trips at night, but nothing. In the last six months, he often had back pain, and thought he was old, so he went to the pharmacy to buy painkillers and ointments. But after a period of time no improvement, so he ate more than a month of Chinese medicine, but those Chinese medicine for his disease or no effect. In the last three months, Mr. Zhang lost another 10 kilograms. The results of the examination took Zhang and his family by surprise: his serum prostate-specific antigen (PSA) was significantly elevated, and the urologist found that his prostate was as hard as a rock after rectal finger examination, and finally, through puncture biopsy, it was confirmed to be prostate cancer with bone metastasis. He Chao Hong, Department of Urology, Henan Cancer Hospital
Patients with prostate cancer are mainly elderly men, and it is rare to see them under 50 years old. The symptoms of frequent urination, urgent urination and difficulty in urination …… are not at all unfamiliar to many middle-aged and elderly men. “It’s not just prostate enlargement, men are like that when they get older. “It is often thought that the abnormal urination of the elderly is the result of prostate enlargement, but there may be a more dangerous “killer” lurking behind it – prostate cancer.
The second most common cancer in the world, the incidence of prostate cancer in our country is low, in recent years, with the economic development, the people’s living standards gradually improve, the diet structure changes, cereals, vegetables, fruit intake reduced, meat and other high-fat, high-protein food intake significantly increased, the aging of society, the proportion of the elderly population gradually increased, prostate cancer, a male disease has become more and more common. The early stage of prostate cancer is not obvious, even if the symptoms appear, it is almost the same as prostate hyperplasia, there will be frequent urination, urgent urination and difficulty in urination, so it is difficult to attract people’s attention. If you blindly think that it is prostate hyperplasia and do not seek medical examination or take medicine casually, you will delay your condition. Most of the prostate cancer patients are already in the advanced stage of cancer when they are diagnosed, so their survival time is very short. 63% of the prostate cancer patients will die every year after being diagnosed in China.
What are the symptoms of prostate cancer? Prostate cancer mostly originates from the peripheral zone of the prostate gland, grows slowly and passes through insidiously, so the early symptoms are not obvious, and once the symptoms appear, it is often late. In order to achieve early diagnosis, we must pay attention to detect and catch some clues. If the following symptoms appear recently, attention should be paid to investigation: (1) Urination disorder: caused by the enlargement of cancer foci pressing the urethra, which manifests as progressive difficulty in urination, thinning or bifurcation of urine flow, prolonged urination, frequent urination, urgent urination, incomplete urination, etc. In serious cases, urine dripping or even urinary retention, or even renal failure. (2) Pain: Mostly due to cancer metastasis to bones or invasion of nerves, bone pain is the main symptom of advanced prostate cancer, mostly seen in lumbosacral and hip pain, pelvic and sciatic neuralgia.
During health checkups for the elderly, special attention should be paid to the prostate condition. Anal finger examination is very meaningful for the early diagnosis of prostate cancer. Anal finger examination is simple and convenient to find out the hardness of the prostate, whether the surface is smooth, whether there are nodules or not, and whether there is pain or not. In patients with prostate cancer, the prostate gland is mostly enlarged, hardened, with more nodules on the surface and incomplete envelope. In addition, there is another indicator of prostate cancer, which is the prostate-specific antigen in the blood test. The prostate-specific antigen in blood is the best tumor marker for prostate cancer and is an important indicator for early screening and evaluation of the effectiveness of prostate cancer treatment. In our usual daily diet, we need to pay attention to the following points: 1. ensure the intake of sufficient amount of selenium, authoritative medical clinical experiments have found that men with high concentration of selenium in human blood have 4 to 5 times lower probability of developing prostate cancer. Selenium is commonly found in the soil, eggs and mackerel contain large amounts of inorganic selenium. The organic selenium in green vegetables is better absorbed by the body than inorganic selenium. Men who eat more garlic, young cauliflower and mushrooms can better absorb organic selenium to effectively prevent prostate cancer; 2.
Finally, we remind our elderly friends that if they have urinary disorders, and the symptoms are recurrent, difficult to cure and gradually aggravated, especially in combination with bone pain, they should go to the hospital in a timely manner, and should not take for granted a diagnosis of their disease according to their knowledge of medical common sense, it is best to go to a major hospital disease specialist to prevent the possibility of cancer.