PROSTATE CANCER

It is rarely seen in 40 year-old men but its appearance increases quickly in posterior decades. Men with a family history of prostate cancer are more likely to suffer from it.

An expert rectal tact provides guidance about the size of the tumour. A blood test provides the Prostatic Specific Antigen PSA. A prostate ecodriven biopsy allows us to elaborate the GLEASON index. With these three parameters, size, PSA and Gleason we can, somehow, predict the biologic behaviour of the tumour and we can define a therapeutic attitude.
	The prostate (of a purple colour in the graphic) is situated around the basis of the bladder and part of the urethra.

The prostate carcinoma can be cured when it is localised inside the prostate but there is controversy regarding its treatment.

Traditionally, there are three possibilities of treatment, total/radical surgery, external radiotherapy and leave it and control it.

Each seed is a titanium seed which contains a radioactive isotope. They are charged in the needles individually or joined in "Rapid Strand".

Nowadays, BRACHITHERAPY, is a procedure with tested results in the control of the illness and in a high proportion of patients’ quality of life. Brachitherapy is a procedure which deposits radioactivity seeds inside the prostate (seeds charged with radioactivity).

Each seed is 1 mm * 5mm length titanium capsule that contains a radioactive isotope. In each treatment between 80 and 140 seeds are deposited permanently. The seeds discharge a high dose of radiation which destroys the tumoral cells hardly producing colateral unwanted effects in the neighbouring undamaged tissues.