UF nurse gets grant to help men with prostate cancer cope with disease
Prostate cancer. It’s not something that men talk about easily, even after being diagnosed with the disease. Yet sharing feelings, thoughts and concerns with others can reduce the depression resulting from life-altering events, such as cancer.
University of Florida nurse researcher Bryan Weber, R.N., Ph.D., has received $142,000 from the National Cancer Institute to find out if a one-on-one support system is an acceptable and effective means for men to deal with the emotional consequences of the disease and its treatment.
“Men don’t talk about prostate cancer; it’s an embarrassing topic to them,” said Weber, a family nurse practitioner and assistant professor with the UF College of Nursing and UF Institute on Aging.
As a result, prostate cancer is often referred to as a silent epidemic.
The American Cancer Society predicts one man in six will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during his lifetime, with 198,000 men in this country diagnosed with prostate cancer just this year. It is the second leading cause of cancer death in men in the United States, exceeded only by lung cancer. Black males are about 34 percent more likely to develop the disease than whites and more than twice as likely to die from it.
The prostate is a walnut-sized gland that produces the fluid that protects and nourishes sperm cells in semen. Cancer cells can grow, usually slowly, in the glandular cells of the prostate. Those cancer cells thrive on testosterone, the most potent hormone found in men.
Consequently, one of the treatments for prostate cancer may involve a reduction in testosterone. There is evidence that supports a link between testosterone and depression -- as testosterone levels go down, depression goes up.
Other treatment-related issues also can lead to depression, such as fatigue, insomnia, and a reduced sexual desire and sexual function.
“Men diagnosed with prostate cancer will have to deal with the emotional consequences of the disease and its treatment,” said Weber.
Support groups have been found to reduce depression for cancer patients, but few men participate in such groups, Weber said. The men who do attend usually go for information rather than to discuss their feelings.
It was after a support group meeting in Ohio that Weber came up with the idea for his study. “Throughout the meeting, the men in the group didn’t say anything,” Weber said. “But, after the meeting, I noticed the men paired off in the parking lot and talked to each other one-on-one for a long time despite the bitter cold.”
In his study, called Friends-for-Life, Weber will monitor 100 men, who are 45 or older and newly diagnosed with prostate cancer. The men will be randomly assigned to one of two groups. Those assigned to the control group will receive the customary health care. The other half will receive the usual health care and be assigned to a support partner who was himself diagnosed with prostate cancer three or more years earlier. Those in the second group will meet individually with their assigned support partner eight times over eight weeks to discuss feelings and concerns that are unique to prostate cancer patients.
All participants will answer questionnaires at the beginning, midpoint and end of the study to determine what support they have received from other people, their feelings and concerns about their life, and to measure the level of depression they experience.