A study looking at changes in the prostate after hormone therapy (CHIRRP)

Cancer type:

Prostate cancer

Status:

Results

Phase:

Other

This study used different scans to find out how well hormone therapy works for prostate cancer.

Doctors often use hormone therapy to treat prostate cancer. Hormone therapy can work well, but sometimes the cancer starts to grow again during or after treatment. Doctors wanted to try and find out why this is.

To do this, they used 2 different scans. The first is called dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE MRI) and looks at the blood flow to cancer cells. The second is called diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) and looks at water movement in cells, so can be used to see whether cells have died.

The aim of this study was to find out whether DCE MRI and DWI scans can help see how well hormone therapy works for prostate cancer.

Summary of results

The research team found that both types of scan could be useful to see how well prostate cancer treatment works.

This study recruited 23 men with prostate cancer. They had scans before starting hormone therapy and 3 months later.

20 men had dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance image (DCE MRI) scans
18 men had diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) scans

The research team found that the 2 types of scan gave different but useful information about whether the treatment was working. Using these 2 scans together may help doctors to see if the cancer is resistant to treatment or not.

The trial team concluded that these two types of scan could be useful to see how well hormone therapy works for prostate cancer.

We have based this summary on information from the team who ran the trial. The information they sent us has been reviewed by independent specialists (peer reviewed Open a glossary item ) and published in a medical journal. The figures we quote above were provided by the trial team. We have not analysed the data ourselves.