Prostate Cancer: Salvage Radiation After Prostatectomy

Overview

Salvage radiation therapy treats the prostate bed after radical prostatectomy when PSA remains detectable or begins to rise and imaging shows no distant metastatic disease. Evidence generally supports considering treatment early, while the PSA is still low, rather than routinely giving adjuvant radiation to every patient with adverse pathology.

The treatment plan may include the prostate bed alone or the pelvic lymph nodes. Androgen deprivation or another hormone treatment may be recommended for selected patients based on PSA, pathology, imaging, genomic information and recurrence risk. The potential benefit and duration of hormone therapy should be weighed against side effects and other health conditions.

Research and Clinical Guidelines