Prostate cancer: Dr Hilary outlines signs and symptoms
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Prostate cancer symptoms must be acted on as soon as they arrive in a bid to arrest the growth of the tumour. Leaving the symptoms untreated can prompt the serious condition to advance. This makes awareness of symptoms front and centre – dysuria should ring alarm bells.
The prostate describes a small gland, located in your pelvis, between the penis and bladder.
Because symptoms of prostate cancer don’t usually appear until the prostate is large enough to affect your urethra, the first red flags can strike on the loo.
In case you aren’t aware, the urethra describes the tube that carries urine from your bladder out of the penis.
One of the “warning” signs of the deadly condition is dysuria, according to the Moffitt Cancer Centre.
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Dysuria is a medical term for a painful or burning sensation during urination.
This uncomfortable sensation is usually the strongest in the urethra or the area surrounding your genitals, the Mayo Clinic explains.
When the prostate presses against the tube, you can start experiencing a whole host of symptoms that strike on the loo.
According to the NHS, the tell-tale signs of prostate cancer can include:
- Needing to pee more frequently (often during the night)
- Needing to rush to the toilet
- Difficulty in starting to pee (hesitancy)
- Straining or taking a long time while peeing
- Weak flow
- Feeling that your bladder has not emptied fully
- Blood in urine or blood in semen.
The good news is that symptoms like these are also triggered by many other and less-serious conditions.
This means that suffering from dysuria doesn’t guarantee you have the deadly condition.
However, you should always get any unusual changes and symptoms checked by a doctor. “Don’t delay seeking treatment,” Moffitt urges.
The NHS states: “These symptoms should not be ignored, but they do not mean you have prostate cancer.
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“It’s more likely they’re caused by something else, such as prostate enlargement.”
Benign prostate enlargement, or BPE for short, describes a condition that can affect how you urinate.
BPE is mainly common in men over the age of 50 and doesn’t usually pose a serious threat to health.
What’s more, having benign prostate enlargement doesn’t put you at a greater risk of prostate cancer.
How to reduce your risk of prostate cancer
While there’s no “sure way” to prevent the deadly condition, research tends to recommend a healthy lifestyle, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Similarly to any healthy diet, opting for a low-fat diet packed with colourful fruits and vegetables should do the trick.
You might also want to consider restricting your intake of dairy products because some research papers found that men who ate a lot of these foods had the highest risk of prostate cancer.
Other interventions like exercising and maintaining a healthy weight could also help.
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