Soon after diagnosis I joined a group headed by a man who viewed PCa as a modern disease with its origin in the womb. His bugbear was "Estrogen-like endocrine disrupting chemicals" (EEDC).
I had come across the weird PCa risk factor of the second to fourth digit ratio, which seemed like voodoo science, but PubMed has 834 hits for ! The finger ratio is a marker of low testosterone in the womb. From a 2017 study:
"Prognostic significance of the digit ratio after hormone therapy for prostate cancer: a prospective multicenter study" [1]
"The digit ratio has been used as a retrospective noninvasive biomarker to investigate the putative effects of prenatal exposure to androgens. In recent years, many scholars have paid attention to the association between 2D:4D (the second and fourth digits) and prostatic cancer.
"This study explored the prognostic significance of digit ratio in prostate cancer patients. We reviewed the progressive status and survival of 382 prostate cancer patients who had received hormone therapy at our institutions.
... & so on ...
"Digit ratio may not only have predictive value in risk but also prognosis of prostatic cancer. This finding suggests that low 2D:4D can be used as prognostic factors to identify patients with a poor prognosis. These patients may benefit from more aggressive management.
"I'll pause a moment while you all go searching for rulers.
When Google Books became available, I went searching for references to PCa in the 1800s.
I should note that the prostate has a long history of being a troublesome gland in aging men. Urologists in the 1800s would have had plenty of patients with BPH issues.
What I discovered in Google Books was that in textbooks published in the early 1800s, authors commonly denied ever seeing PCa, but sometimes reported that one or two cases had been reported by others. The quote below comes from Walter Hayle Walshe in "The Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology and Treatment of Cancer". It was published in 1849.
Note that a "scirrhus" is cancer that is hard to the touch.
"Page 308, in Cancer of the Genital Organs:
"(B.) PROSTATE GLAND. - True scirrhus is of a singularly rare occurrence in the prostate. Mr. Travers has found the organ occupied by a small tumor, possessing all the characters of scirrhus; and met with instances in which the stony hardness and enlargement of the gland, the bloody seminal discharge, and the peculiar pains felt in the thighs and elsewhere, seemed to leave no doubt of its being the seat of that form of cancer.
"Sir B. Brodie relates two cases of presumed scirrhus of this organ. "There was a constant and severe pain referred to the neck of the bladder, which was not relieved on the urine being drawn off. The urine deposited a considerable quantity of adhesive mucus, and was of ab ammoniacal odor. [This is mere evidence of the existence of chronic cystitis.] The prostate was found on examination to be much enlarged, and of a stony hardness. The patient complained of excruciating pains in different parts of the body, which could be compared to nothing except the pains under which persons afflicted with carcinoma occasionally labor. He subsequently became hemiplegic, and died in a fortnight." "
Two more paragraphs & Walshe was done with PCa as a topic.
By the end of the 1800s, PCa had seemingly become more common. The word "rarity" is no longer used.
PCa would have been under-diagnosed of course, but with metastatic disease, a urologist would have known that a patient had bigger problems than urinary difficulty.
Anyway, I began to wonder if the Industrial Revolution could be implicated. By 1840, the Industrial Revolution would have been going full steam. There would have been a latency period before PCa cases became common.
CADMIUM. (for example)
Cadmium was discovered in Germany in 1817, and Germany was the main supplier of cadmium for nearly a hundred years. It was only due to the onset of WWI that America began to produce cadmium to meet domestic needs.
However, because of the prior lack of interest in extracting cadmium from ore outside of Germany, mining & smelting operations resulted in serious pollution around the world.
Camium is commonly found with zinc, and zinc products are often contaminated with cadmium.
Our bodies have no need for cadmium and it is recognised as being carcinogenic.
From 2001 [2]:
"Prostate cancer has become epidemic, and environmental factors such as cadmium may be partly responsible. This study reports malignant transformation of the nontumorigenic human prostatic epithelial cell line RWPE-1 by in vitro cadmium exposure. The cadmium-transformed cells exhibited a loss of contact inhibition in vitro and rapidly formed highly invasive and occasionally metastatic adenocarcinomas upon inoculation into mice."
From 2007 [3]:
"Case-control study of toenail cadmium and prostate cancer risk in Italy"
"We found an excess cancer risk in subjects in the third and fourth (highest) quartiles of toenail cadmium concentration (odds ratio 1.3 and 4.7, respectively) compared with subjects in the bottom quartile."
From 2008 [4]:
"High cadmium / zinc ratio in cigarette smokers: potential implications as a biomarker of risk of prostate cancer"
(Smokers have increased risk for PCa, Most likely, this is due to the cadmium in cigarette smoke.)
"Tobacco smoke may be one of the most common sources of cadmium (Cd) in the general population, particularly in the rising population of smokers in developing countries. Although a relationship between both cigarette smoking and environmental Cd contamination with prostate cancer exist, the mechanisms are unclear.
"Most prospective cohort studies found a positive association between current smoking and a fatal cancer of the prostate.
"We investigated the interaction between zinc and cadmium and the potential risk of prostate cancer in smokers. Serum cadmium level was significantly ... higher in smokers compared with non-smokers, the level in smokers was three-fold that in non-smokers. In contrast zinc was significantly ... reduced in smokers compared with non-smokers. ... Zinc: cadmium ratio was very significantly ... reduced, implying high cadmium: zinc ratio. This ratio was 4.5-fold the level in non-smokers."
From 2012 [5]:
"Cadmium and its epigenetic effects"
"Cadmium (Cd) is a toxic, nonessential transition metal and contributes a health risk to humans, including various cancers and cardiovascular diseases; however, underlying molecular mechanisms remain largely unknown. Cells transmit information to the next generation via two distinct ways: genetic and epigenetic. Chemical modifications to DNA or histone that alters the structure of chromatin without change of DNA nucleotide sequence are known as epigenetics. These heritable epigenetic changes include DNA methylation, post-translational modifications of histone tails (acetylation, methylation, phosphorylation, etc), and higher order packaging of DNA around nucleosomes. Apart from DNA methyltransferases, histone modification enzymes such as histone acetyltransferase, histone deacetylase, and methyltransferase, and microRNAs (miRNAs) all involve in these epigenetic changes.
"Recent studies indicate that Cd is able to induce various epigenetic changes in plant and mammalian cells in vitro and in vivo. Since aberrant epigenetics plays a critical role in the development of various cancers and chronic diseases, Cd may cause the above-mentioned pathogenic risks via epigenetic mechanisms. Here we review the in vitro and in vivo evidence of epigenetic effects of Cd.
"The available findings indicate that epigenetics occurred in association with Cd induction of malignant transformation of cells and pathological proliferation of tissues, suggesting that epigenetic effects may play a role in Cd toxic, particularly carcinogenic effects. The future of environmental epigenomic research on Cd should include the role of epigenetics in determining long-term and late-onset health effects following Cd exposure."
Epigenetics & Heritability.
Lamarkism, in contrast to Darwinism, had it that parents could pass on characteristics acquired in their lifetime. It's a discredited theory that oddly returned to life with epigenetics. However, with epigenetic heritability, the genes thenselves are unchanged. Alterations that occur above the gene level can be passed on. Too bad the slate isn't wiped clean at conception.
-Patrick
[1] pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/287...
[2] pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/112...
[3] pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/171...
