Many medical professionals who treat prostate cancer patients – primarily oncologists and radiologists – have long been puzzled by a single question. Why do some men who demonstrate elevated PSA levels who are regularly and carefully monitored, and demonstrate repeated negative results at biopsy still go on to develop aggressive and difficult to treat prostate cancer? Researchers at the Princess Margaret Hospital now believe they have found the answer.

It is they say, that tumors can lie hidden on the top of the prostate where they are undetectable by the most commonly used diagnostic tools, including the needle guided biopsy. Their research demonstrates that the use of MRI technology is far more effective at spotting these hidden, but potentially dangerous growths.

A team consisting of urologists, pathologists and radiologists studied 31 patients at the hospital who had demonstrated positive biopsy results and whose tumors lay at the top of their prostate, as seen on an MRI scan. They found that in 87% of the cases the scan found the hidden tumors fairly easily.

The team has given a name to these lurking dangers. PEATS, which stands for” prostate evasive anterior tumor syndrome” and they feel that this is something that all those who treat men with elevated PSA levels should become more familiar with the concept in order to diagnose the presence of prostate cancer most effectively.

In Great Britain , where the Princess Margaret Hospital is located and the study conducted , about 34,000 new cases of prostate cancer are diagnosed every year, while in the United States there are on average 192,280 prostate cancer diagnoses made each year and 27,360 deaths as a result.

Another recent British study, this time conducted by researchers from the University of Liverpool, has been able to make another break through. They discovered that the presence of a genetic heat shock marker – called Hsp-27 – could provide a reliable indicator of how prostate cancer would progress in individual patients. According to the authors of that study the presence of Hsp – 27 at the time of diagnosis were almost twice as likely to die from the disease as those men in whom it was not detected.

There are numerous ways to treat prostate cancer once it is diagnosed and medical professionals feel that the discovery of this molecule marker may help them spare some men from treatments that may be unnecessary, especially given that a number of the common treatments do have significant side effects.