By Monique Washington, Nevispages.com
CHARLESTOWN, Nevis –Though there was a decrease for the year of 2017 in the number of men that turned out for the free annual prostate screening, there has been a reported increase in the abnormality rate.
In January, Dr. Daniel Caruso and Dr. Chris Gomez joined Urologist, Dr. Dwayne Thwaites and Brian Cohen to offer free prostate testing to men in Nevis. This year marked Thwaites’ 10th year performing free testing in Nevis.
According to the official report,Thwaites and his team screened five hundred and seventy eight (578) persons with 10.55% of them being persons screened for Prostate Cancer for the first time. In 2016, six hundred and twenty two (622) persons were screened. Thwaites informed that there was an abnormality rate of 14.53%, and an increase of 0.06% over last year’s abnormality detection rate.
In January, during a press conference, Dr. Thwaites indicated that they were seeing persons who have never been screened before coming to them with late stage prostate cancer.
In 2014-2015, eight percent (8%) of the men that were tested showed abnormalities compared to ten percent (10%) in 2016. Thwaites said that the increase can be linked to the increased number of men tested. While there have been abnormalities, it does not necessarily mean the person has cancer
“The only way someone can be diagnosed of having cancer is with a pathological exam which means that that person has to have a biopsy to confirm it. The said person can have an abnormal mass on examination and normal PSA and no cancer. That same person can also have low PSA and a normal exam and may still have cancer,” Dr. Thwaites stated.