Confused!

[Cammie2016]

Hi all, hope you are all doing well

My dad was diagnosed September time, Gleason 9 (4+5) with solitary bone metastasis. He has been accepted on the Trombone study and randomised for surgery, he’s also having Docetaxel he’s had his first one and tolerated it well and these are every 3 weeks. But he’s received a letter which explains what Docetaxel is but then says...

“ been shown to improve survival by 10-12 months on average”

and just that sentence has set him back now and scared him. I tried saying that this is on top of all the many years left you have due to the other treatments, I’m right aren’t I?

[gusgold]

Yes, you are right

[Hidden]

Yes, it's added time.

[Tall_Allen]

Yes. It means on top of how long he would have survived without the therapy.

[AlanMeyer]

I'll add to what others have said by saying that the treatments are synergistic. Getting one treatment may extend life expectancy by X time and another by Y time. But we are now learning that getting X+Y together appears on average to extend life expectancy by more than X+Y time.

And I'll also add that new treatments are in development and life expectancies keep going up. I don't know how aggressive your father's cancer is, but I do know that many men on this group have lived much, much longer than anyone would have predicted ten years ago, and that the trend is for that improvement to continue.

Your Dad should concentrate on leading a healthy life style and on enjoying life. He's got a serious disease, but there's still much in life to enjoy even with prostate cancer.

Alan

[Cammie2016 in reply to AlanMeyer]

Thank you for your reply Alan, hope you are well.

[Break60]

Yes

[larry_dammit]

Let him read these posts on this site, the doctors are so mean about the statistics they post. Mine was a 50/50 chance of 5 years ,had me pretty down then I read about these guys doing 10-15 years made me feel better

[Cammie2016 in reply to larry_dammit]

I’m reading them to him now while he has chemo, giving him so much encouragement. Thanks Larry hope you are well.

[j-o-h-n]

+

Good Luck and Good Health.

j-o-h-n Monday 04/09/2018 7:25 PM EDT

[Clarejb]

Hello! Hope you are well. Happy to hear your dad is tolerating the chemo well. My dads just done round 4 and doing ok, just a bit more sleepy than usual. That's the way I interpreted the stats too, 10-12 months in addition to the many years ahead. Best wishes to you and your dad, been meaning to drop you a line xxx

[Cammie2016 in reply to Clarejb]

Hi Clare, lovely to hear from you, glad your dad is doing well, always in my thoughts xxx