A substance produced by prostate cancer cells may let doctors use a simple urine test to judge if a man’s disease is likely to be aggressive and life-threatening, researchers said yesterday.
Doctors struggle to determine when a man is diagnosed with prostate cancer if the disease may kill him or not. As a result, many men whose tumour may actually pose little threat end up getting extensive treatment, such as surgery and radiation, they may not need.
Researchers at the University of Michigan pinpointed an amino acid called sarcosine that is produced by prostate tumour cells and is present in urine that, at higher levels, indicates the cancer is more serious.
“What we see is that among men with metastatic prostate cancer, the level of this amino acid is higher in the urine compared to men with just slow-growing cancer, your run-of-the-mill, garden-variety prostate cancer,” said Dr John Wei of the University of Michigan. The researchers said the idea initially would be to develop a urine test to give to men already diagnosed, and it may or may not be possible in the future to develop a new prostate cancer screening test. – (Reuters)