radical prostatectomy for prostate ca -- scandanavian study 18 yrs later
the Scandinavian prostate cancer group study just published their 18 year followup of radical prostatectomy vs watchful waiting in men with localized prostate cancer (study prior to PSA testing, and was largely of men with palpable nodules). see prostate ca scandan 18 yrs nejm 2014 in dropbox , or DOI : 10.1056/ NEJMoa1311593. this follows their 15 year followup published a couple of years ago. in brief, --695 men with early prostate cancer randomized to surgery vs watchful waiting, followed up to 23.2 years, though overall analysis at 18 year mark: -- 63 deaths from prostate cancer in surgery group and 99 in watchful waiting (18% vs 29%, RR 0.56), absolute diff of 11% and NNT to prevent one death = 8 --200 deaths from all causes in the surgery group and 247 in the watchful waiting group (56.1% vs 68.9%, RR 0.71, abs diff 12.8%) ...