MADRID, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- A team of researchers at the Spainish Clinica Universidad de Navarra has developed a treatment that is expected to offer hope to prostate cancer patients.
The treatment known as "irreversible electroporation" has proven to be 85 percent effective at killing prostate tumors while allowing 100 percent of patients to retain their capacity for urinary continence.
Clinica Universidad de Navarra published a communique on its website on Tuesday referring to an article in The Journal of Urology, which summarized the results of the relatively non-invasive technique. According to the article, it allows tumor "cell destruction by means of a series of short, high-voltage electrical pulses."
Prostate cancer was the most common cancer among men in Spain between 2014 and 2021. According to the researchers, 85 percent of patients treated with irreversible electroporation saw their tumors controlled and none of those treated suffered a possible side effect of incontinence.
According to Bernardino Minana, coordinator of the Prostate Cancer Area of the Clinica Universidad de Navarra and main author of the study, the results make up the "prospective cohort published with the longest follow-up to date with this technology."
He said the treatment is indicated for patients with "low-risk or intermediate-risk tumors, with a visible lesion on MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) and who do not want radical treatments."
The Clinica Universidad de Navarra cited the Spanish Society of Medical Oncology as reporting 260,000 new cases of prostate cancer in Spain in 2020, which is "well above the other most common cancers among the male population: urinary bladder cancer (150,000) and colon cancer (126,000)." ■
