Video: All about prostate cancer

Prostate cancer kills 1 man every hour in the UK - so don't be one of them - know the symptoms, and then report to your doctor!

One in twelve men in the UK will develop prostate cancer - but 60% of men don't know the symptoms of this potentially killer disease.

Symptoms of prostate cancer

One of the problems with prostate cancer is that in its early stages it often does not cause any obvious symptoms. When they do occur they may include any of the following:

• Needing to rush to the loo to wee.
• Passing urine more often, daytime and/or night-time
• Slow at getting the flow or urine started
• Weaker flow of urine
• Starting and stopping whilst passing urine
• Discomfort (pain or burning) whilst peeing
• Feeling of not having emptied the bladder fully
• Dribbling after you've finished peeing
• Blood in urine or semen
• Pain or stiffness in the back, hips or pelvis

Many of these symptoms can be due to just simple enlargement of the prostate, which occurs as men get older. This is not cancer and is called Benign Prostatic Hypertrophy (BPH) - 'benign' meaning non-cancerous, 'prostatic' meaning relating to the prostate, and 'hypertrophy' just means enlargement.

If you're a man over the age of 40 with any of the above symptoms, don't put it down to just getting older - tell your GP!

Other resources:

• www.everyman-campaign.org
• BUPA Fact sheet on Prostate cancer
• Health encyclopaedia entry on Prostate cancer

This article was published on Tue 29 September 2009