If you’re a healthy man in your forties with no family history of prostate cancer and you’re not African American (a group with increased risk for prostate cancer), should you get regular PSA testing? If you were to ask actor/comedian/director Ben Stiller that question, he’d definitely say yes. Dr. Danoff explains why he agrees with Stiller that PSA testing can save lives.
In an article written for Medium, actor Ben Stiller revealed that he was diagnosed with early prostate cancer—and beat it—in 2014. When I saw him on television recently, he looked fit, alert, and vigorous and bore no apparent adverse effects from his battle with cancer.
Stiller reported that his diagnosis was initially made because his PSA (prostate-specific antigen) level was elevated. The controversy surrounding the efficacy of PSA testing in a man who shows no cancer symptoms and is not deemed at high risk (no family history of cancer and not of a vulnerable ethnicity) has been hotly debated, but in this case, the test seems justified.
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For more information on prostate and other urologic cancers, read The Ultimate Guide to Male Sexual Health: How to Stay Vital at Any Age.
Dudley Seth Danoff, MD, FACS, is a diplomate of the American Board of Urology and a fellow of the American College of Surgeons. Born in Brooklyn, New York, Dr. Danoff is a graduate of Princeton University, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. He received his medical degree at Yale University with honors. He completed his urologic surgical training and fellowship at Columbia University Presbyterian Medical Center in New York City. Following his training, he served as a major in the United States Air Force Medical Corps. For more than a quarter century, Dr. Danoff taught on the clinical faculty of UCLA School of Medicine. Currently, he is attending urologic surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He is the founder and president of the prestigious Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Tower Urology Medical Group, the leading urologic practice serving the Southern California community for over thirty years. Dr. Danoff and his wife, Israeli singer Hedva Amrani, are longtime residents of Beverly Hills, California, and have two children: Aurele Danoff, an attorney, and Doran Danoff, a composer.