Prostate Cancer, part of Chapter Introduction:

Anatomy, cancer statistics, tumor formation

In men the urethra is enclosed below the bladder output of a gland: the prostate or prostate gland. Behind the prostate is the rectum, below the pubic bone and above the bladder and the seminal vesicles. In the immediate vicinity of the prostate extending nerves and blood vessels.
The gland is divided into two lobes, right and left of the urethra, which are surrounded by a capsule. Within this connective tissue sheath consisting of two halves of the prostate from muscle fibers and especially from glandular cells.

These cells form glands secrete a fluid which flows through the urethra. In an ejaculation separates the prostate from a larger quantity of this liquid, which then forms the ejaculate with sperm. It provides the mobility and fertilizing capacity of sperm.


Growth hormone-dependent

Growth and function of the prostate is the male sex hormone testosterone dependent. Without the stimulation by the hormone that is produced in large quantities until the beginning of puberty, the prostate remains underdeveloped and does not produce mucus.
Testosterone affects life as a growth stimulus to the prostate: in the second half of life can be observed in many men benign enlargement, called benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) or benign prostatic adenoma. The actual trigger for this increase are unknown, probably need a combination of factors.

Benign growths are usually due in part to the prostate surrounds the urethra. Difficulty urinating are therefore a typical symptom. Prostate cancer grows, however, nine out of ten patients in the outer glandular portion, especially on the side facing the gut.

Prostate cancer: most common cancer in men

Prostate cancer is now the most common cancer in men, behind them for about a quarter of newly diagnosed cancers is cancer of the prostate gland. In Germany, currently at over 60 100 men diagnosed each year of prostate cancer. The significantly increased number of diagnoses, however, stand against any increase in mortality, the Society of Epidemiological Cancer Registries and the Robert Koch Institute in early 2010 (brochure "Cancer in Germany", available for example under www.gekid.de).
The fact that the statistics have changed compared to previous years such explain that to the experts in Germany are often carried out PSA testing, the testing for prostate-specific antigen. The representatives of the Cancer Registry assume that is achieved with the PSA test merely advancing the diagnosis by several years. This assumption is also suggested that in the statistics, the average age dropped from 70 years to the current 69 years. Before age 50 Age of prostate cancer occurs very rarely, and in young men, the disease is unknown.
Why is the early detection of prostate cancer is discussed by experts controversial, the Cancer Information Service has compiled in a separate chapter.
Tumor development and tumor biology: How is cancer?

The word cancer is for a large group of very different diseases with one thing in common: the uncontrolled division of cells of an organ or tissue. Cancers are divided into the

* So-called solid tumors, which include prostate cancer. These are tumors that are confined at least in early stages of an organ or a separate body region.
* Other cancers are the so-called systemic cancers. Here, the tumor cells originate from the blood-forming bone marrow and are over the entire associated body "system" spread, which includes the blood and lymphatic system.

Malignant tumors are withdrawn other than benign or benign tumors, the normal growth control of the body, they multiply unchecked in the rule. Like other solid tumors can also prostate cancer through its connective tissue capsule also grow into surrounding tissues, destroy it and replace. Individual tumor cells can detach from the surrounding tissue and migrate via the blood or lymphatic vessels in other body regions. Below a prostate disease progresses, patients are found in tumor cells such as in the lymph nodes or the bone.

We now know that cancer is caused by changes in the genetic information of a single cell. Escapes this cell the body's control mechanisms and can they share despite the changes further, it is these qualities also apply to their daughter cells. A resulting tumor often has many properties of the tissue from which it originated. However, there are tumors that lose their growth with increasing tissue-typical characteristics more and more, new or have increasingly become less functional.
record in cancer research scientists this particular biological properties of tumors and compared them with those of healthy tissue. The findings from these studies have a growing importance for the Krebsdiagostik.

In general, many factors combine to convert a cell into a cancer cell. As little as there is the cancer, so little one can speak of the cancer cause. Although we now know a lot of carcinogenic chemicals or other harmful external influences, they play but by no means in all tumor types involved. Prostate cancer, the influence of such factors have not detected or at least uncertain.
And genetic "accidents" or congenital instabilities eventually lead to cancer: With each cell division, which is the renewal and regeneration of healthy tissue in the course of life necessary to statistically increase the likelihood that this something will go wrong.

What is now known about the development of prostate cancer and why it is hardly possible to prevent this type of tumor, described in the following chapter.