Prostate cancer: The 15-minute test could save so many men's lives

The changing rooms were a little cramped, but unlike a hospital there was nothing intimi-dating about it. One minute I was being squished and x-rayed, the next I was back on the tarmac, ready to carry on with the shopping.

So far it’s only women you’ll see queuing outside these inconspicuous mobile clinics. One day, however, as a new medical breakthrough suggests, it could be men waiting their turn for a “scan in a van”, in their case to be screened for prostate cancer.

A trial conducted by University College London (UCL) on 303 men aged 50-75 has strongly indicated that a 15-minute MRI scan is far more effective at detecting aggres-sive prostate cancer than the current blood test.

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This test, which looks at PSA (prostate-specific antigen) levels, can sometimes miss aggressive tumours, or result in “overdiagnosis”. So promising are the UCL’s results, it is now hoped that, if the next and larger trial proves equally encouraging, it might represent the first step towards a long-awaited and badly-needed national screening programme.

In the words of Simon Grieveson, assistant director of research at Prostate Cancer UK, “When prostate cancer is caught early, it’s very treatable. Sadly, more than 10,000 men each year are diagnosed too late, when it has already spread.”

No wonder experts say that an NHS strategy for routine screening is “desperately needed”. Every year more than 52,000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer, and every year 12,000 die of it.

Last summer my husband was one of the 52,000, so it’s a subject close to my heart. I’ve lost count of the number of friends who, on hearing the phrase ‘prostate cancer’, were quick to reassure him that it’s “one of the best ones to get”.

They were correct, up to a point. If it’s caught in good time, that is. When, after a series of increasingly worrying tests, Alan was finally called in to be told that he had cancer – by this point it came as little surprise – we held onto the word treatable.

But it’s not always the case. Bad enough to be told you have cancer, infinitely worse to learn that it has gone beyond the point of help. One of the problems with prostate can-cer is that it can be symptomless.

Over-fifties who disappear too often to the gents joke about their troublesome prostate, as if it’s an unavoidable pothole on the road to old age. They console themselves by saying it is enlarged – which might be all it is – while putting to the back of their minds another, less palatable alternative.

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Yet for some, there are absolutely no indications that anything is amiss. Why go to a GP to request a PSA test if you have no reason to think there might be an issue? And even if you were tested, it might give false reassurance.

For young men in particular, this is a truly frightening thought. One hopes – indeed assumes – that those who have a heightened genetic risk will be eligible if and when routine scanning begins.

Among the hurdles doctors face when trying to tackle prostate cancer rates is many men’s innate reluctance to seek medical advice. I suspect that half the guys I saw in hospital waiting rooms were there as a result of their wives or partners urging or nag-ging them to get checked out.

Even so, going to a GP when you’re worried you might have something life-threatening is never easy. Nobody wants to hear bad news, or go through uncomfort-able or awkward procedures (Alan discovered they aren’t that bad). Yet the alternative is far, far worse. As, to my eyes, is what rugby players inflict on each other in the heat of battle, without uttering a whimper.

This is why I was upset when a friend in his early sixties, who summoned the courage to ask his GP for a PSA test, was refused. Even though it isn’t failsafe, shouldn’t it be on tap for anyone over 50, or for younger men who think there’s something wrong?

Trepidation and cowardice – perhaps reticence and stoicism are better words – might explain why the death rate in the UK from this particular cancer is twice that of the US, Spain or Italy. For whatever reason, though very probably one of the above, it seems there is a low take-up of optional testing.

As it stands, middle age for men is like a lottery: do they have it or don’t they? The thought that a simple MRI scan could give them a reliable answer would transform men’s health, putting their minds at ease or getting them into treatment early.

Professor Mark Emberton, author of the MRI study, knows the difference this could make: “I’m confident that a national screening programme will reduce the UK’s prostate mortality rate significantly. There is a lot of work to be done, but I believe this will be possible within the next five to ten years.”

What a game-changer this could prove to be. If he’s right, and MRI scans can be rolled out across the country, society will be transformed.

Under such a scheme, regular screening should become commonplace. It will be a no-fuss part of life, like the bowel screening test that comes through the post, cheeringly alerting you to reaching your mid-century, and marking every other birthday thereafter until your mid-seventies.

And because the MRI scan will be by invitation and won’t require someone to take the initiative, it might well reach those who would otherwise be too anxious or embarrassed to put themselves into medical hands.

The UCL’s trial was called Reimagine, which seems appropriate. At last, we can imagine a world where this deadly disease will cause far less devastation and loss.

We can picture a future in which men are given a simple test, whose results they can trust. Thanks to timely intervention, more husbands, partners, friends, brothers and grand-dads will live into healthy old age, without the shadow of this disease hanging over them, and all who love them.