Building a Prostate Cancer Lifestyle Medicine Program

Abstract

According to the National Cancer Institute, there are approximately 1.7 million men living in the United States with a diagnosis of prostate cancer. To this number, approximately 230, 000 new cases of prostate cancer will be diagnosed, and 29, 900 men will die of the disease this year in the United States alone. Presently, there is a tremendous, unmet medical need for treating the disease, particularly early-stage prostate cancer, and as its etiology is understood in more detail, lifestyle changes are becoming an increasingly crucial part of the preventative and management process. Ethnic disparities in prostate cancer incidence and prognosis are an emerging challenge, and new immunotherapies are coming to the forefront of treatment planning in neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and advanced disease settings. Underpinning this is the knowledge that a more holistic approach to treatment has genuine benefits in terms of clinical outcomes and avoidance of treatment-related complications. With that in mind, a Lifestyle Program has been built at Mount Sinai Urology, and its development from inception through content, infrastructure, human resources, patient care and flow, reverse engineering, and future plans are all described here in detail.