A new prostate cancer test that could transform the way the disease is diagnosed and treated is now available at Spire Roding Hospital, Spire Healthcare’s private hospital in Redbridge near Ilford in Essex.
Top urological surgeon Shiv Bhanot believes the PCA3Plus test is more effective than the more commonly available PSA (Prostate Specific Antigen) test.
Prostate cancer is diagnosed in about 35,000 men in Britain every year, and 10,000 a year die from the disease. The standard tool for detection of the disease is the PSA test, which looks at raised levels of protein in the blood that leaks out of the prostate gland.
But the new test measures a genetic chemical messenger RNA which transfers DNA instructions form the PCA3 gene. Elevated scores are produced only when cancer is present.
“The PSA test can sometimes provide misleading results, but the PCA3Plus test is much more specific,” said Mr Bhanot. “I think it will transform the diagnosis of prostate cancer because it will help doctors decide whether or not to proceed with multiple biopsies, which are painful and can have unwanted side effects,”
