Jul 27, 2014 • 22M

"Get Screened" or Surviving Prostate Cancer (the 2nd Most Deadly Cancer Among Men): A Conversation with Guido Adelfio & Howard Topel (July 24th)

 
1×
0:00
-22:03
Open in playerListen on);
    Substack App
    Download MP3
    Get a private RSS link for listening
    Subscribe to The Healthcare Policy Podcast ® Produced by David Introcaso to get a private link for listening in your favorite podcast player. Learn about RSS.

Appears in this episode

David Introcaso, Ph.D.
Podcast interviews with health policy experts on timely subjects. The Healthcare Policy Podcast website features audio interviews with healthcare policy experts on timely topics. An online public forum routinely presenting expert healthcare policy analysis and comment is lacking. While other healthcare policy website programming exists, these typically present vested interest viewpoints or do not combine informed policy analysis with political insight or acumen. Since healthcare policy issues are typically complex, clear, reasoned, dispassionate discussion is required. These podcasts will attempt to fill this void. Among other topics this podcast will address: •Implementation of the Affordable Care Act •Other federal Medicare and state Medicaid health care issues •Federal health care regulatory oversight, moreover CMS and the FDA •Healthcare research •Private sector healthcare delivery reforms including access, reimbursement and quality issues •Public health issues including the social determinates of health Listeners are welcomed to share their program comments and suggest programming ideas. Comments made by the interviewees are strictly their own and do not represent those of their affiliated organization/s.
Episode details
Comments

Listen Now

A few years ago the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality sponsored billboard ads that stating simply "this year thousands of men will die from stubbornness."  The message was intended to encourage moreover middle age men to seek preventive health screening since they are 25 percent less likely than women to visit a doctor in any one year and 30 percent more likely to be hospitalized for a preventable condition.   While prostate cancer is largely survivable, aside from non-melanoma skin cancer, it is the most common cancer among men (most prevalent among African Americans) particularly men over age 50, it usually presents without any symptoms and men "stubbornly" ignore being (routinely) tested.   Nearly 200,000 cases are diagnosed annually causing over 28,000 deaths.  While the value of PSA testing is debated, a digital rectal exam, while incomplete, evaluates the back of the prostate where 85% of prostate cancers arise.   

During this 21 minute discussion Guido shares his personal experience, i.e., how he came to be diagnosed, his treatment (still ongoing) and his efforts to public raise awareness.   Another prostate cancer survivor,  Howard Topel, comments on his treatment and survival - that he owes to hearing Guido's "get screened" presentation.        

For the past 30 years Guido Adelfio has managed his family's custom travel business (Bethesda Travel Center, LLC) in Bethesda, Maryland.  After a happenstance conversation with a friend about preventive health screening, Guido scheduled a prostate screening exam.   The exam determined he had Stage IV metastatic prostate cancer.   His diagnosis was determined to be fatal.   Fortunately Guido was able to enroll in a NIH experimental treatment therapy program that saved his life.

Topel

Howard Topel is a 66 year old retired communications attorney.  He represented radio and television station owners for 38 years.  Through the early detection of a PSA test, he was diagnosed at the age of 55 with highly aggressive form of prostate cancer.  The early detection saved his life, and he now fully enjoys retirement with his wife Andria and watching his children Fred and Melanie and infant granddaughter Celia grow and thrive.

For more on prostate cancer and screeing see the related CDC information at: http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/prostate/. 

Share