Aspirin a day may help treat prostate cancer

A DAILY dose of aspirin significantly improves the test results of men with prostate cancer, research has shown.

Taking the pill causes their PSA level to fall, suggesting that it is helping the body fight the disease.

PSA, or prostate specific antigen, is a protein, and its levels are often elevated in men with prostate cancer. PSA levels are used to monitor progress of the cancer.

However, scientists are still not certain that aspirin really does protect against the disease which kills up to 600 Irish men each year.

It is possible that lowering PSA may not affect the disease, and instead cause some cancers to go undetected.

The research involved 1,277 men taking part in a large US investigation called the Nashville Men’s Health Study.

About 46% of the men were regularly taking a non- steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) such as ibuprofen or aspirin. The majority, 37%, took aspirin.

Aspirin use led to 9% lower PSA levels, the scientists reported at a meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research in Washington DC.

The effect was strongest in men with prostate cancer, suggesting it was having an impact on the disease.

A high PSA reading may indicate cancer but a biopsy is needed to confirm that it is present. All men involved in the study were referred for prostate biopsies.

Dr Jay Fowke, from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, who led the research, said: “We need to know whether that [taking NSAIDs] reduces their prostate cancer risk, or simply reduces PSA, which would then be even less reliable as a marker of prostate cancer risk.

“Basing treatment on an artificially suppressed PSA score would also be problematic.”

Despite its name, PSA has been discovered in women and been detected in female breast tumours.