Blackhawk wrote: Fri Mar 21, 2025 6:44 pm
And #1 rule to remember about reading scary statistics: Survival rates are based on those who survived for five years after treatment. That means that any survival rates you see are, at the minimum, five years out of date. They're discussing the result of treatments performed at least five years ago. Since they aren't updated every day, you're more likely looking at data that's between six and ten years out of date. Cancer treatment is evolving
fast. Five or ten years is like multiple decades for most other sciences. The real numbers are typically much better than the statistics you see online.
I read a good article (maybe book) on this some years ago. A lot of statistics are scare tactics to drive business, such as "our drug is 50% more likely to prevent X disease" is disingenuous if the chances of getting X disease in the first place is .0001%. The statement might be true, but odds of you getting X disease with or without the drug is inconsequential.
The article (book?) addressed prostate cancer specifically. It's not considered a particularly lethal cancer, and in most cases, you will die of something else even living 20 years or more with prostate cancer. The article (book) suggested in some cases, the treatment was more harmful than the disease.
That said, my late friend Don (whom Hepcat had met at an Octocon), had a particularly aggressive form of prostate cancer. His initial chemo seemed to have knocked it out, his PSA was trivial for nearly 2 years. Then surprise! It came back stage 4. He died about 6 years ago after trying every experimental treatment available.
Channel strength from our local hero Blackhawk. Survivor stories are the best.
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