Game-changing prostate cancer treatment available at UT Health San Antonio

One in eight men will develop prostate cancer in their lifetime. Of those, one in 44 men will die of the disease. Those statistics from the American Cancer Society are startling.

But men facing an advanced prostate cancer diagnosis who are being treated at the Mays Cancer Center, home to UT Health San Antonio MD Anderson Cancer Center, now have one more arrow in their quiver to fight the disease.

The center is the only institution in South Texas offering a novel targeted molecular therapy using a radioactive drug to fight metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.

Penny Vroman, MD, a nuclear radiologist at UT Health San Antonio, said the new treatment is a game changer for men who have failed multiple other types of treatment including chemotherapy.

"What's unique about this therapy versus traditional chemotherapy that affects the whole body is that this is a targeted molecular therapy," she said. "So, whereas chemotherapy kills both cancer cells and good cells throughout the entire body, which is why patients tend to have more side effects, this new treatment binds only to the prostate cancer cell and kills those prostate cancer cells."

Vroman said that because of the treatment's precise nature, patients are more likely to tolerate it better as compared to other treatments.

Aggressive treatment approach

At 67, George Moore appears to be the picture of health despite having dementia and aphasia, limiting his ability to speak. Often, his wife, Denise Moore, speaks for him.

The couple married in their 40s while living in Austin, then moved to California in 2001. In 2017, while the couple was living in California, George Moore was diagnosed with metastatic prostate cancer.

"He went into treatment right away but we were both a little shocked," Denise Moore said. "At the time, he had just turned 60 and had just never had any issues."

When he was diagnosed, George Moore was told his prognosis was fewer than 10 years. So, the couple asked for an aggressive treatment plan. They experienced years of disease stability and instability through various types of treatments.

Now settled back in San Marcos, Texas, George Moore has been receiving care at Mays Cancer Center. The one thing that was the most difficult throughout the six infusion treatments was the time he and Denise had to spend apart physically. Patients are required to stay six feet from their loved ones for three days and seven days from pets to minimize exposure to radiation after a treatment.

"We had to be very, very careful with exposure. I must have said 100 times a day, 'six feet,'" Denise Moore said. "We didn't leave the house for three days. After seven days, we talked about going out to dinner, but I said, 'What if the waitress is pregnant? We can't take a chance of doing that.' So, we took long walks."

In May, George Moore received his last treatment at Mays Cancer Center. After a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test, his PSA level had significantly decreased and is now nearly undetectable.

Denise Moore said getting married later in life helped them get through the highs and lows of the disease.

"When you enter into a marriage at that time of your life you do everything together," she said. "We grocery shopped. We cooked. We made all our financial decisions together. And you know something? When you face something like this, you tackle it and move on."

The future

Vroman said the hope for the future is that the treatment will be approved for use on patients long before the disease progresses to other parts of the body.

"The incidence of this cancer is just going to continue to increase. So, our overall goal is if we can get this treatment to these patients even earlier in their disease process, it will prolong survival and save a lot of overall costs associated with prostate cancer care," she said.

Asked what the future holds for him, George Moore lovingly looked at his wife and said, "Our life together."

Public link

Please use the above public link if you want to share this noodl on another website.