Prostrate Cancer

Causes and Risk Factors for Prostate Cancer

There are several categories of risk factors that can cause prostate cancer:

Age: The risk of developing prostate cancer rises after the age of 50.

Race: Prostate cancer is more common among African-American men then among Caucasian men and is less common among Asian and American-Indian men.

Family history: The risk for developing prostate cancer is higher if there is a family history of prostate cancer among male members of the family (especially among close related males like father or brothers).

Diet: Recent studies suggest that a diet rich in animal fat or red meat increases the risk of developing prostate cancer.

Medical conditions: The risk for developing prostate cancer is higher when the patient suffers from a medical condition called prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PIN). PIN can occur early, around the age of 20, and half of all men who develop this condition do so by the time they are 50. The main characteristic of PIN is changes in the appearance of prostate gland cells. These changes are classified as low grade (almost normal appearance) and high grade (abnormal appearance). For those men diagnosed with high grade changes, the risk for developing prostate cancer is between 30 to 50 percent.

Medical procedures: Some early studies suggest that men who had a vasectomy (a surgical procedure to render men sterile by severing the tubes that carry out the semen from the testicles) increase their risk for developing prostate cancer. It also believed there is an increased risk of prostate cancer if the vasectomy takes place at younger ages (before age of 35). However, research studies conducted to associate vasectomies with an increased risk for developing prostate cancer are contradictory and this issue is not resolved.

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Article by Alina Morrow, MS
Medical Writer
OmniMedicalSearch.com

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