EPCA-2 test

My friend undergoing evaluation @ age 71 has been asking me many questions.
I am not a Dr. and advise him not to get in a panic.
He wanted to know what the EPCA-2 test was?
I am not familiar with that.

He has an appointment with Stanford Medical University on July 6th and I
told him not to get in a rush to judgement. At his age of 71, but in
excellent health he may need nothing.
I explained to him to let the Dr. re-evaluate his records and tests, and
then if they feel necessary they may do a biopsy.
I told him not to jump the gun, and do not think he needs this until it is
advised by the primary cancer specialist.

I wanted him to get on board this group, but he wanted me to ask some
questions for him.
Thanks for your help,
John

On Jul 1, 7:47*pm, "jloomis" <jloo...@ocean.net> wrote:
> My friend undergoing evaluation @ age 71 has been asking me many questions.
> I am not a Dr. and advise him not to get in a panic.
> He wanted to know what the EPCA-2 test was?
> I am not familiar with that.

EPCA-2 test is a new, not yet fully approved for general use. It is
being tested I believe at Johns Hopkins, and it stands for Early
Prostate Cancer Antigen test. It is supposed ly better than just PSA
test, as it attempts to isolate the presence of cancer antigen, and
thus they claim a 90% plus accuracy of prostate cancer detection.

cmdrdata wrote:
> On Jul 1, 7:47 pm, "jloomis" <jloo...@ocean.net> wrote:
>> My friend undergoing evaluation @ age 71 has been asking me many questions.
>> I am not a Dr. and advise him not to get in a panic.
>> He wanted to know what the EPCA-2 test was?
>> I am not familiar with that.
>
> EPCA-2 test is a new, not yet fully approved for general use. It is
> being tested I believe at Johns Hopkins, and it stands for Early
> Prostate Cancer Antigen test. It is supposed ly better than just PSA
> test, as it attempts to isolate the presence of cancer antigen, and
> thus they claim a 90% plus accuracy of prostate cancer detection.
>


Actually EPCA-2 stands for: early prostate cancer antigen-2 (EPCA-2),
PCA3 stands for prostate cancer gene 3 (PCA3). Both biomarker tests
appear to be much more specific to detect PCa than PSA is. PCA-3 tests
are being applied in European countries, and apparently by your friend's
urologist to reduce the risk of an unnecessary biopsy.

This Newsweek story discusses both:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/91659

This is an article by Robert Getzenberg, the discoverer of the EPCA-2
biomarker, and co-owner of a royalty interest in the test:


http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/c...9082/HTMLSTART