This is finally making the news after Medical Oncologist Samuel Denmeade, M.D. of Johns Hopkins Cancer Center earlier reported testing almost two years ago (tinyurl.com/gobjaxn). Apparently with this couple years supporting the effectiveness of this high/low testosterone therapy it is now making the news and we may be seeing increased use of this form of prostate cancer treatment. Please note that it is IMPORTANT that patients not try this on themselves. Physicians with experience, or sufficient knowledge of this therapy, should be involved.
Actually, Medical Oncologist Dr. Bob Leibowitz is the pioneer in administering high doses of testosterone to cause PC cell apoptosis. Bob Leibowitz, Los Angeles, California, Compassionate Onc Medical Group, 2080 Century Park E, Suite 1005, Los Angeles, CA 90067-2009, Tel: 310-229-3555, email: info@compassionateoncology.org, Website: compassionateoncology.org. Take the time to visit his website and read his use of high dose testosterone replacement therapy (TRT). Example: compassionateoncology.org/p... and there several others on his website.
Chuck
DISCLAIMER: Please recognize that I am not a Medical Doctor. Rather, as a medical detective, I have been an avid student researching and studying prostate cancer as a survivor and continuing patient since 1992. I have dedicated my retirement years to continued research and study in order to serve as an advocate for prostate cancer awareness, and, from an activist patient’s viewpoint, to voluntarily help patients, caregivers, and others interested develop an understanding of prostate cancer, its treatment options, and the treatment of the side effects that often accompany treatment. There is absolutely no charge for my mentoring – I provide this free service as one who has been there and hoping to make your journey one with better understanding and knowledge than was available to me when I was diagnosed so many years ago. Readers of this paper must understand that the comments or recommendations I make are not intended to be the procedure to blindly follow; rather, they are to be reviewed as my opinion, then used for further personal research, study, and subsequent discussion with the medical professional/physician providing your prostate cancer care.
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Charles (Chuck) Maack - Prostate Cancer Patient/Activist/FORMER Mentor (Because of age related health issues, had to limit what had been worldwide daily mentoring)
(A mentor should be someone who offers courtesy, professionalism, respect, wisdom, knowledge, and support to help you achieve your goals; would that I succeed)
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I wonder what this means for us long time patients, it seems that most of these Men did pretty well on this shock therapy, once again kudos to Dr Bob Liebowitz
I like the idea. It seems to make sense, but I struggle to find a theory that fits all the "facts". I would like to figure out what the "facts" are.
Is any of this true:
1. Boys who are castrated don't get prostate cancer.
2. When adult men are castrated, their testosterone drops below 1 within a week, and their PSA drops to below 20 within a week. (Is this true or false?)
3. With ADT, testosterone drops quickly but over a few months, and the PSA drops generally in step with the drop in testosterone.
4. The main function of the prostate is to produce PSA, and the cells can function over a range of testosterone concentrations in the blood, because each cell a range of testosterone receptors that increase the concentration of testosterone in the cytoplasm of the prostate cell.
5. How long do prostate cells live? Or do they divide after a certain number of days, rather than die? Or why do they die? Or stop dividing? Can prostate cells go into a quiescent state, where they are alive, but not producing PSA?
6. Is testosterone an ingredient in PSA? Is it consumed in the creation of PSA?
7. Do prostate cells need testosterone to live? (no)
Chuck, it's great to see a new post from you, an addition to the valuable information & services you've provided so many times over the years.
This is fascinating & informative stuff; so far I read the discussion by Bob Liebowitz that you linked to. It's a shame that all these decades have gone by without clinical trials to tell us when in our course of treatment that we should consider TRT, although it's not surprising that testosterone, like vitamin D3, doesn't attract big research funding in prostate cancer. But there is some evidence from clinical practice that TRT can be enormously helpful to some men, & it doesn't seem to damage anyone. The huge quality of life improvement sounds quite delightful!
In Chuck's previous comments in other forums on Dr Denmeade's work, he drew attention to Dr Denmeade's caveat that " the long-term effects or dangers of the therapy aren't yet known. Only longer, larger trials will help uncover any risks associated with the treatment".
Chuck also mentioned the worries by Dr. Anthony D'Amico, chief of radiation oncology at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston::
"A cancer cell could escape and grow, as happened in breast cancer when this method was tried with estrogen, causing early death," said .
D'Amico agreed that bipolar androgen therapy is not ready to be used in clinical practice and doctors should wait for the results of ongoing trials before offering it to men.
"All adult men in the research were being tested for circulating tumour cells in their blood and 6 of them were being identified to have a protein referred to as androgen-receptor splice variant (AR-V7), which might be involved with resistance to treatment with enzalutamide. Following BAT treatment, AR-V7 disappeared from the blood of all 6 adult men, and two of the adult men experienced declines in PSA ranges of 50% and more than."
I have no idea why AR-V7 cells, which do not need T, would disappear in the presence of T.
But it should be noted that AR-V7 is often implicated in resistance to Zytiga & Xtandi. For those who test positive to AR-V7, the Denmeade protocol offers hope.
re "I have no idea why AR-V7 cells, which do not need T, would disappear in the presence of T."
I had thought that population of ARV7 cells was out competed for resources when there was enough testosterone to raise the activation levels of the still sensitive cells. I am in one of Denmeade's trials. He did not seem to think that this idea was correct, and it had been thought about previously. I might not be representing well (or at all) what the thinks on this.
The "tiny url" linked to in the original post appears to include sections of an address given in English that were translated into German, and then that re-translated into English. It loses something.
“In our lab we have observed that testosterone interferes with portion of the mobile division approach in most cancers cells referred to as DNA licensing it also appears to trigger prostate most cancers cells to make breaks in their DNA. So as well substantially testosterone can trigger most cancers cells to die....". Hmmm.
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