Can radiation therapy be used for advanced prostate cancer?
External-beam radiation therapy can help control the growth of localized tumors. It can also help men live longer without symptoms of disease. Brachytherapy (radiation seeding) is technically difficult to do in large prostate tumors. So it is less often used in men with advanced disease. External beam radiation can also be an effective method for controlling disease that recurs after radical prostatectomy. The radiation is directed to the part of the body where the diseased prostate was removed. Brachytherapy cannot be used in this case because the gland has been taken out. That leaves no place to embed the seeds. Some men’s tumors are not diagnosed until they have reached stage III or higher. When that’s the case, whether radiation therapy will be effective depends on the status of regional lymph nodes. If the nodes are removed and appear to be disease-free, the chance for long-term survival is much better than if they have cancerous cells.
