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PSA - Coggle Diagram
PSA
What is it?
Serum tumour marker
Why measure them?
Monitor response to therapy
Check for malignancy and identified involved organs
Establish 'tumour burden' and predict response (prognosis)
General limitations
Lack of clinical specificity for early cancers
Rarely elevated in early malignancy
Rarely raised in all cancers of a particular type
hCG is an exception to this
Present in all trophoblastic malignancy
Lack of clinical specificity for malignant cancer
Most markers are present in normal tissue
Many are elevated in benign disease
Often raised in many different cancers
PSA is an exception to this
almost completely prostate specific
Prostate Specific Antigen
Dissolves in seminal coagulum to increase sperm motility
Circulates in free and bound forms in serum
'Free' PSH is found in malignant prostatic disease
Prostatic disease
Benign prostatic hyperplasia occurs naturally in some men later in life
It has many similar symptoms to prostate cancer
Difference in tumours from BPH and prostatic cancer
In BPH the tumour is smooth and symmetrical
In prostatic cancer the tumour is hard, stony and nodular