Skin patches 'tackle prostate cancer'

[xchrom]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-21628911

Skin patches which deliver oestrogen into the blood may be a cheaper and safer treatment for prostate cancer than current therapies, a study says.

The main treatment is injections of a chemical to cut levels of testosterone - the driving force of many prostate cancers - but it causes side effects.

The Imperial College London study in the Lancet Oncology compared patches and injections in 254 patients.

It found patches were safe and should avoid menopause-like side effects.

[BlueStreak]

1. We are being swamped with profiteers pushing Low-T. Does this mean ...

that all this emphasis on boosting mail testosterone is likely to lead to higher rates of prostate cancer in a few years?

[Frosty1]

2. Probably

I think men will run into some of the same problems women did with estrogen replacement therapy.

[unc70]

3. Likely, plus folate-enriched grains and flour

This treatment has a lot if problems, at best. The Low-T push can have a modest impact in certain subsets of prostrate cancers. Enriching flour, etc. with folic acid (to reduce birth defects) seems possible as a larger contributor to increasing rates of prostrate cancers.

[BlueStreak]

4. That may be a cause for the current level of prostate cancer, but the point is

that the study suggests that more T may correlate with more prostate cancer. And with these out-of-control quacks and pharma companies pushing T like heroin, it seems to me that could very well result in a new wave of prostate cancers in another 10-20 years, over and above the levels we already have.

[unc70]

5. Possibly. The folates issue confounds the research

Because we have changed the background folate levels over the past decade or so makes it really tricky trying to determine the impact of other factors.

I agree that pushing testosterone could well be a risky move. Don't think we understand the interactions well enough yet.