Men whose prostate cancer returns after surgery or radiation therapy may now have a new, life-extending treatment option.
A new clinical trial has shown that combining a drug called enzalutamide with standard hormone therapy can lower the risk of death by more than 40% for these patients.
The trial results were published in The New England Journal of Medicine and presented at the European Society for Medical Oncology Congress in Berlin.
This is the largest study of its kind for men with high-risk biochemically recurrent prostate cancer—a condition where the cancer comes back aggressively after initial treatment.
After surgery or radiation therapy, doctors usually monitor PSA (prostate-specific antigen) levels in the blood. A sharp rise in PSA can signal that the cancer is returning and may soon spread to other parts of the body, like bones or the spine.
Until now, the main treatment has been hormone therapy, which lowers testosterone levels to slow cancer growth. However, this treatment alone hasn’t been effective at improving survival rates.
In this new study, more than 1,000 men from 17 countries were followed across 244 medical sites. The participants were split into three groups: one group received hormone therapy alone, the second received enzalutamide alone, and the third received a combination of both.
After eight years of follow-up, researchers found that men who got the combination treatment had a 40.3% lower risk of dying compared to those who received either treatment on its own. This is a major breakthrough for patients who previously had very limited options.
Dr. Stephen Freedland, co-lead author of the study and director of the Center for Integrated Research in Cancer and Lifestyle at Cedars-Sinai Cancer, said this is a “game changer” for treating this form of prostate cancer. He explained that standard hormone therapy has been used for decades but has never been shown to improve survival on its own.
Thanks to earlier studies, enzalutamide is already approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in other prostate cancer cases. It’s also included in treatment guidelines by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network.
These new results are expected to strengthen those guidelines and help make the combination therapy a standard option for men whose cancer has returned after initial treatment.
Dr. Hyung Kim, a urologic cancer expert at Cedars-Sinai, added that this new data confirms what earlier studies have suggested—that enzalutamide can help men live longer when used in different prostate cancer settings.
This research is an example of how science and medicine can work together to improve lives. With better treatment options now available, men facing aggressive prostate cancer after surgery or radiation may have a stronger chance at long-term survival.
If you care about cancer, please read studies about Researchers find a new cause of cancer and findings of Scientists make a big breakthrough in prostate cancer treatment.
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The study is published in New England Journal of Medicine.
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