controversial new position. the task force which says men should not be screened routinely for the psa test. as you probably know by now, it it s a simple blood test, and it s the only screen test for prostate cancer, which is the second leading cause of cancer deaths in men. the american cancer society supports these new guidelines and other groups do not. i m here today with dr. otis sprawly from the american cancer society and also dr. scott miller, who says not screening could cost lives. we ll get to that denit bait, but, first, i want to explain some of the reasoning behind the new recommendations. basically they say that more people could end up harmed by unneeded treatment after a worrisome psa result than are saved by early detection. now, we talk about these numbers a lot, but it s not an abstract number. i want to bring in dr. jeffrey stark, a pediatrician in houston who last year became a prostate cancer patient himself. welcome back. hanks for joining us. as i sa
what happened after that? sefrbl yecertainly years ago slight rise in psa from screening, and then i had more testing and had a slight rise in my psa, and the yourologist wand to do another biopacy, and i got extremely sick, even though i had antibiotics, i got a severe bacterial invection. my blood pressure went low, and i was hospitalized for four days in houston. you re okay now? that s all resolved? i m fine. i had a heart rhythm problem afterwards as well, but now everything is fine. i don t have proskatate cancer. dr. miller, you hear a story like that, there are lots of different cases, but what do you think as a your alurologist whe hear something like this? he got harmed from going to the biopsy, the heart problem. how big a concern is that? i m very concerned. i sympathize with dr. stark s position, his perspective on it, and i m happy he s fully recovered and doesn t have prostate cancer, but that s a complication of the biopsy. what the task force has pu