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PROSTATE CANCER SUPPORT SITE

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Gary C and Debbie live in Florida, USA. He was 56 when he was diagnosed on March 24, 2009. His initial PSA was 3.0 ng/ml, his Gleason Score was 6 and although he thinks he was staged T1b, it seems from his narrative that he would have been staged T1c. His choice of treatment was Da Vinci Robotic surgery. Here is his story.


Because of my job, I am required to have a routine physical once a year. I am so thankful of this, because this is how I discovered I had Prostate Cancer.

From 2007 to 2008 my PSA rose from 1.9 to 2.3. The doctor doing the physical recommended I follow up with a urologist because of this rise over a 1 year period. My urologist recommended I have another PSA in 6 months.

I did this at the beginning of March. My PSA rose to 3.0 and he told me I needed
to have a biopsy done. He took 12 specimens, 6 from the left side and 6 from the
right side. Unfortunately, when we got the results, 10 of the 12 were deemed
cancerous. The involvement ranged from 5% to 50%.

Of course my wife and I were very concerned, so the research began. A mentor at work told me about the YANA website and I began reading it that very night. Wow, the information I learned from just reading testimonial after testimonial. So much information and done in a fashion I could relate to.

From YANA I learned about Dr. Patel at Celebration Hospital. I had my appointment with him on May 13th. Dr. Patel said that my prostate needed to be removed because of the amount of cancer involvement. My surgery is scheduled for mid July and I am now in the process of doing all the preliminaries so that surgery can take place.

I will follow up after my surgery and let you how everything went.

 

UPDATED

July 2009

 

 

Had my surgery on July 17th with Dr. Patel from Celebration Hospital using the DaVinci Robot. Surgery lasted about 1 1/2 hours. I was in my room by noon.

The only real pain I had was around the incisions. My abdomen felt as if I had done 200 situps. By 3:00 pm the nurses had me up and walking the hall. I was slow, but able to walk for about 10 minutes. I was only allowed liquids that day and after "dinner" I was walking again. I probably walked about 5 times that evening. Again, the only real pain I had was the soreness in my abdomen. The catheter is not fun, but I got used to it.

I was released from the hospital around noon the next day. We took it easy around the house, but I walked 10 minutes every hour. The doctor said walking was the best thing to do to help recuperate. On Tuesday the 21st I had my cystogram to see if I was healed enough to have the catheter removed. I was, and it was removed. With great joy I felt freedom again. Doing Kegel exercises for about 2 months prior to surgery was a great benefit. That helped to keep my bladder muscle strong and since the removal of the catheter I have had only one slight accident.

At that same appointment, I was given my pathology results and the news was great. The cancer was contained in the prostate and it was noted that my prostate had only 20% cancer. My Gleason score remained at a 3+3. We are thanking Jesus for this wonderful news.

I will have my first PSA done in early September and am hoping that it supports the good news I have received.

Since receiving the news that I had cancer I would like to make some suggestions to anyone newly diagnosed. First, after the shock of knowing you have cancer, do your research. Read, Read, Read, anything and everything you can to learn about Prostrate Cancer. Choose the method that you feel is best for you. Be sure to include your spouse in the decision making. This affects her life too. Next, if you choose Robotic surgery, make sure you choose a doctor that has performed lots and lots of these. This is a relatively new procedure and you do not want to be one of the first cases to have the surgery by an inexperienced surgeon. If you can, Dr. Patel in Celebration, Florida (Orlando) has done about 3,000 of these. He and his staff have refined every step of the way to make this unfortunate experience as comfortable as possible. Their first concern is for you the patient. Lastly, keep the Faith and as YANA states, there is life after Prostate Cancer.

Gary's e-mail address is: gdm5252@live.com