This is not the place to ask medical questions. None of us is qualified
to answer.

However: That increase in PSA test results appears to me to be trivial
and unlikely to be cause for concern.

I rarely agree with uros, but this time I do.

Regards,

Steve J

"Know your enemy. Get educated. But also know that it won't be easy. It
will be confusing, overwhelming and depressing. That is the nature of
cancer and thus the very educational process as you regain control."
-- Robert Young, PCa Mentor
Phoenix 5

First, I'm not a doctor and my answers are worth exactly what you are
paying me for them.

That said, it's probably not real good, but at this point it's too
early to get really concerned. One test in and of itself means little;
you look for a trend. If you have a series (no less than 3)
consecutive rises in PSA, with the tests done every 3 months, then you
may have reason to be concerned and maybe need to do something
(probably salvage radiation).  But right now, I am reasonably certain
most doctors will tell you it's premature to do anything.

Check out the thread a few threads before this discussing at what
level of PSA you should be concerned after RP. The consensus varies
between 0.1 and 0.5; your 0.03 is way below (less than 1/3) the lowest
threshold.

Keep doing the tests every 3 months and see what your trend is and
then you may need to make a decision but not now. For now, relax!

Also, even if your trend continues (which we don't know yet), it
appears that, after 5 years, your particular cancer is slow-growing
and not particularly aggressive.

Fred

In recent tests I have been >.05.  Then in went up to >.07.  Last test it
went down to >.05.  It's the trend that is important, not tiny little blips
like this.  If it were I, I would give much more credence to my uro than my
GP in matters regarding PCa.

My RRP preceded yours by four days. My subsequent PSA bounced around in
the 0.006 to 0.020 range much of the time since then, plus rising
linearly three successive quarters to about 0.024 and nearly doubling
three successive quarters to 0.031, its highest post-RRP peak.

That was several readings ago. My last two quarterly readings were
<0.002. All were from the same lab using the same test.

My whole university teaching hospital oncology board paid close
attention to the two triple rises, particularly considering that both
rises looked very consistent, but they were not surprised when the
increases apparently turned out to be random noise. We're all back in
the old routine now: test my PSA twice more at 5-month intervals, then
go to six-month intervals at the 5-year date in 2009, and just watch ...
and watch ... and watch ... until some far more definitive PSA peak
arrives, I get so danged old it doesn't matter any more, or I die from
something else. Given that I went in with a Gleason 4+4 and seminal
vesicle involvement, I'm well ahead of all the 2004 predictive nomograms
and my 2009 nomograms look dramatically better than the 2004 ones.

Realize that all my anecdote proves is that ultrasensitive PSAs *can* go
down again. Subjectively, it reinforced my oncology board's suspicions
that us PSA readings mean little, if any, more than the usual PSA tests.

I.P.

3 doublings every 3 months may be a reason to investigate further.
J

First, welcome to our newsgroup.  You will find a wonderful collection of
helpful souls here.

Second, to establish a protocol as to who's advice is more qualified.
Assuming you have decent people at each level, considering the stage you are
in now (post RP), the people most qualified to comment on your condition
are:

1. Oncologist
2. Urologist
3. General Physician
4. Wonderful collection of helpful souls here

That said, I would agree with your uro at this point.  No one can determine
from one PSA check whether you have experience biological failure.  My more
recent PSAs have undulated so much that I no longer report them in my
signature as anything but, "undetectable since"  July 2006.

Should you be concerned?  No.  Will you be?  Ha!  Of course you will.  While
you worry, try to keep in mind the following:

1.  Prostate cancer cells produce PSA, but they are not the only cells to do
so.
2. Your result, if it was not a lab mistake, indicates that your PSA is
three-thousandths of a millionth of a gram of PSA in two liters of blood.

Steve, I'm getting deja vu. This is what I was talking about.

If you're going to have ultrasensitive PSAs you're going to have to be
ready for blips and not freak out over them. It could be the first
point in a trend or it could be nothing. So, yea, you repeat quarterly
and find out which it was. But this just comes w/ the territory.

Denis, are you taking any supplements?

Bill/Memphis

Take the test again now - within the next couple of weeks.

or

Wait three months.

These tests aren't always accurate.

Especially at levels of 0.03

Its your decision.