Warning to everyone who reads the postings from Wst4512.  It appears
that the website referred to has as its main purpose to get you to order
a book, which allegedly will tell you how to deal with prostate cancer.
 Some of what is said on the website is misleading at best.   It refers
for example to a Swedish randomized study comparing patients who were
treated with radical prostatectomy to another group who were treated by
watchful waiting followed by hormone therapy if needed.  The patients
were followed for a relatively brief period of time averaging about 6
years or so.   The surprising result was that those treated by radical
prostatectomy showed a statistically significant lower death rate from
prostate cancer.   However, the overall death rates from all causes
during the same period were not different enough to draw a conclusion of
statistical significance.   Much has been made of the latter result by
critics of radical prostatectomy.   But the upshot is that this is one
scientific study of relatively short duration. The authors noted the
information about overall death rates but did not try to draw
significant conclusions from them.  There is no way, for example, from
this study to draw conclusions about how these patients will do after
10, 15 or more years.  Also, the patient population differed in
important respects from the population of US men diagnosed with prostate
cancer.  So a lay person should not try to draw conclusions about proper
treatment for prostate cancer one way or the other from such a study.
There is a host of other data about prostate cancer and there are other
scientific studies of this kind in process.   It is fair to say that
there is some difference of opinion in the scientific community about
these matters, but a lay person is not really in a position to evaluate
it.  That should be left to those schooled in the relevant disciplines.

If you have been diagnosed with prostate cancer, you would be well
advised to trust the opinion of well qualified doctors.   If you have
questions about these matters or you question whether the recommended
treatment is advisable you should certainly ask probing questions, and
you may also want to seek second opinions.   But don't rely on things of
this nature that you read on the internet in making your decisions.

If you look carefully, there are some other things about this website
that seem curious.  For example, there is a list of physicians who treat
prostate cancer.  I recognize some of them.  One might be tempted to
conclude that these doctors endorse what the website says, but if you
look carefully, there is no statement to that effect.  I would doubt
that many of them would.  Some of them, for example, treat patients with
seeds.   If radical prostatectomy is not a successful way to treat
prostate cancer, then it is also seems that seeds would not be
successful.   There have been no studies showing that seeds or other
forms of radiation are on the average more successful than radical
prostatectomy over a wide range of cases.   The reputable scientific
skeptics who criticize radical prostatetectomy would in fact also
criticize other forms of aggressive treatment for early prostate cancer
such as seeds.  The website by singling out surgery ignores this point.