About Aiming At Life: Targeting Ice Against Prostate Cancer
Cryotherapy, or freezing, is a minimally invasive procedure that uses lethal ice to destroy prostate cancer. Research over ten years has shown cryotherapy to be at least as effective as surgery and radiation, with rapid recovery and high quality of life following treatment. Aiming At Life is designed to help prostate cancer patients and their families determine if cryotherapy, with its advantages, is a treatment option to discuss with their physician.
Dr. Stephen Scionti received his undergraduate degree Magna Cum Laude from Brown University and his Medical Degree through the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, Scholars in Medicine Program. His experience includes Staff Urologist at the U.S. Naval Hospital (Charleston, SC), Assistant Clinical Professor of Urology at the Medical University of South Carolina, Staff Urologist at Hilton Head Medical Center and Clinics, and Senior Partner of Coastal Carolina Urology Group (Hilton Head Island, SC). He is the Director of the Prostate Cancer Center and specializes in minimally invasive radiation free prostate cancer treatment.
Dr. Scionti began performing prostate cryotherapy in 2001. He has done over 500 cases, and now treats 12-15 prostate cryotherapy patients each month. He is an active proctor, teaching other Urologists to perform their first cryosurgical procedures. He also offers Regional and National Training Workshops in this procedure at his CryoCare Center and Hilton Head Regional Medical Center.
Dr. Scionti participates in a national prostate cryotherapy computerized database to continually monitor results, complications and quality of life in his cryotherapy patients. He has been appointed to the advisory board of the COLD Registry.
Dr. Scionti can be reached at CryoCare Center on Hilton Head Island, SC, by calling toll-free 1-866-422-2284 or via his website at www.cryocarecenter.com.
If you are a patient with localized prostate cancer and you are exploring treatment options, you have arrived at the most important point of this book: Why should you consider cryotherapy?
Before I review the case for cryo, I want to emphasize that this book is not a substitute for personal medical advice. Only face-to-face dialogue with your physician can help you clarify your alternatives. He or she is qualified to explain your test results and your treatment options. If your doctor has strongly recommended one treatment over another, hopefully he or she has acquainted you with why it is in your best interest, and made it easy for you to understand. I speak for myself and all of my colleagues when I say that we want you to have confidence in us, but unless you ask us about what you don’t know or understand, we can’t be sure that we have covered all the information that an individual may need or want. When it comes to cryo, if by chance your doctor has ruled it out on the grounds that it is “experimental,” feel free to pass along this book, or have your doctor get in touch with me. I would welcome a chance to set the record straight!
Cryo Kills Cancer
The foremost advantage of freezing is how effectively it destroys cancer. As you learned, the processes involved in freezing to lethally cold temperatures and doing a double freeze/thaw cycle are destructive to cancer cells in several ways. Some are mechanical and some are biochemical. Put simply, ICE KILLS CANCER. Thanks to today’s computer-assisted technology, an experienced cryosurgeon achieves equal or greater success when compared with surgical removal of the prostate, or radiating it inside the body.
Remember: no prostate cancer treatment comes with a 100% guaranteed cure. However, if you agree with me that cancer is demolished for good if it is completely encompassed by lethal ice, and if you agree with my research that freezing offers established success equivalent to other treatments and in some cases better, you should consider cryo.
Cryo Is Minimally Invasive
Compared with surgical removal, cryo is a minimally invasive procedure with reduced time under anesthesia, outpatient capability, and rapid recovery time. With the use of ultrasound imaging and temperature monitoring, we can get a precision iceball inside the body where we want it, with no cutting or blood loss. Patients often enjoy a return to normal activity within days, and resumption of more strenuous physical activity such as exercise and lifting in a couple of weeks.
Patients often report only swelling and/or bruising in the first few days after cryo, and minimal use of over the counter pain medication, if any. In fact, there are rarely any complaints following treatment except for the use of a catheter to drain the bladder for a week, more or less, before it is removed for normal urination. I tell my patients, “We’re going to take a short period out of your life, beat your cancer, get you recovered and then you’re going to go on with your life.” When I explain cryo to them, they have realistic expectations. They expect that for up to a month after treatment they may have minor urinary symptoms, but then they’re going to get better. That’s the usual experience, and if the pace of recovery is important to you, you should consider cryo.
Cryo is Non-Nuclear
Medicine often walks a fine line between saving life vs. destroying hostile agents such as bacteria, viruses and cancer. The same things that can harm the body (cutting, burning, freezing, poisoning) can be harnessed for good, to rid the body of disease. There are many exciting advances in nuclear medicine for treating cancer. However, many people really don’t like the idea of radiation in their bodies.
Cryotherapy gives patients an alternative to radiation. Both freezing and radiation are minimally invasive (external beam is technically non-invasive, while brachytherapy