Prostate cancer: a new protocol makes it possible to double survival for the most serious cases – South West

A team led by Professor Karim Fizazi, from the Gustave Roussy anti-cancer center in Villejuif (Val-de-Marne), announced on Sunday, at the European Cancer Congress (ESMO), in Paris, the hopeful results of ‘a study on prostate cancer, France Inter reports this Monday.

The PEACE-1 study involved 1,173 patients with metastatic prostate cancer, recruited in France, but also in Spain, Belgium, Italy, Ireland, Romania and Italy. These were divided into four groups and the study gave “impressive” results on one of the groups.

The patients received combinations of different treatments: either simple hormone therapy, which prevents “the body from producing the male hormones that nourish the tumor”, specifies France Inter, and chemotherapy. Either chemo and two hormone therapies; either chemo, simple hormone therapy and radiotherapy; or, finally, chemo, two hormonal therapies and radiotherapy.

“Two and a half years of a more serene life”

Result: the association between chemotherapy and the administration of two hormone therapies made it possible to obtain a median survival doubled. A result that Professor Karim Fizazi, quoted by public radio, considers “rare” in the fight against cancer, and “very impressive”.

“The progression-free survival of cancer is very clearly improved here,” says the researcher. It goes from two years for patients who only receive two treatments to more than four and a half years for those who have all three. That’s two and a half years of a more serene life, and the risk of tumor progression is reduced by 50%! “

Similarly, “overall survival is also improved with a risk of death reduced by 25%, even for the most severe cases with a lot of metastases,” he continues. “For them, we go from about three and a half years of life expectancy to five years! In France, 50,000 prostate cancers are identified each year in France, including at least 3,000 in the metastatic stage.