What is the most common treatment for prostate cancer?

For men with localized prostate cancer who are not candidates for active surveillance alone, or who are not comfortable with this approach, there are a number of options to treat their disease. The most common treatments chosen by men in the US are surgery (nearly half of all men), followed closely by radiation treatments (about 40%).

Currently there is no reliable evidence that one of these treatments is “better” than the other for the long-term management of prostate cancer. Instead, studies show that most men with localized prostate cancer will do well for at least 10 to 15 years no matter which of these treatments they choose. I

The 5-year survival rate for localized prostate cancer in the US is nearly 100% (meaning fewer than 1 of 100 men with prostate cancer will die of this disease in the first five years after diagnosis), and the 10-year survival is nearly 98%.

The decision between surgery and radiation often comes down to how men think and feel about the potential short-term and long-term side effects and complications of these treatments – not the risk of dying.