RESEARCHERS at Oxford Brookes university will be part of the largest ever study in the UK into prostate cancer – the most common form of the disease in men.

Life After Prostate Cancer Diagnosis will spend up to £2.2m on researching what life is like for the 250,000 men living with and beyond the disease in the country and what steps can be taken to improve their lives.

The announcement comes as men across the county began sprouting hair on their upper lips to raise money and awareness for male cancer charities as part of Movember.

Professor in supportive cancer care Dr Eila Watson will lead the survey development team at Brookes to ensure the men interviewed are from a wide range of communities and backgrounds. Once the men have been selected they will be sent a confidential postal survey that will ask them about the impact the disease has had on their lives and how they coped with it, such as their attitude towards their illness and how they dealt with treatment and its after-effects.

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Dr Watson said: “This is a very exciting initiative.

 

“It’s great news that men with prostate cancer are now living for longer, but we need a better understanding of the issues men face in the years following diagnosis and treatment and the impact prostate cancer has on their quality of life.

“This study will give us the opportunity to ask men of all ages and backgrounds, from all over the UK, what things are really like for them, what issues are most important, and where any gaps in services and support are. This will allow us to improve care for men diagnosed in the future.”

Similar studies have been planned in the Republic of Ireland and Australia as part of the Movember initiative.

Once all the studies are complete the information will be pooled to help the research teams learn from men’s experiences across the world.

Researchers from the University of Leeds, Queen’s University Belfast, the University of Southampton and Public Health England will also work on the British project, funded by the Movember Foundation and Prostate Cancer UK.

The Movember Foundation’s director of programmes Paul Villanti said: “We urgently need to know more about prostate cancer if we are to ensure every man returns to feeling just as well as they did before their prostate cancer diagnosis and for the first time this unique initiative should enable us to discover the answers we need.”

To find out about taking part in the project, email Amy Downing at the University of Leeds at A.Dowming@leeds.ac.uk The Oxford Mail is tracking some of the men across Oxfordshire taking part in Movember, including London Welsh captain Ricky Reeves, Oxford United club secretary Mick Brown and county councillor Arash Fatemian.

Are you taking part in Movember? Send us your photos: @TheOxfordMail on Twitter, facebook.com/oxfordmail or by emailing news@oxfordmail.co.uk


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