What is chemotherapy?

Chemotherapy means treatment with a cytostatic agent. Cytostatic drugs work by poisoning cells. They have a particularly strong effect on cancer cells because these cells have a higher metabolic rate than other cells in the body, which makes them more sensitive to these drugs. Treatment is aimed at killing the cancer cells as completely as possible, while doing as little damage as possible to the rest of the body.

When is chemotherapy required?

It is very common for hormone therapy to lose its effectiveness after long-term use. Because in this case the cancer continues to grow even where the level of testosterone is comparable to that after castration, this is known as ‘castration resistance’. One possible treatment option is chemotherapy.

In addition, recent studies have confirmed that early use of chemotherapy (when metastases are first detected) has a beneficial effect on disease progression.

Which drugs are likely to be used?

The best response rates are achieved using a class of drugs called taxanes, which includes docetaxel and cabazitaxel. This class of drugs is well tolerated, with relatively few side effects. An additional advantage is that these drugs can easily be administered as an outpatient or day case procedure.