BJU international
-
WHAT'S KNOWN ON THE SUBJECT? AND WHAT DOES THE STUDY ADD?: A competent urologist should not only have effective technical skills, but also other attributes that would make him/her a complete surgeon. These include team-working, communication and decision-making skills. Although evidence for effectiveness of simulation exists for individual simulators, there is a paucity of evidence for utility and effectiveness of these simulators in training programmes that aims to combine technical and non-technical skills training. This article explains the process of development and validation of a centrally coordinated simulation program (Participants - South-East Region Specialist Registrars) under the umbrella of the British Association for Urological Surgeons (BAUS) and the London Deanery. This program incorporated training of both technical (synthetic, animal and virtual reality models) and non-technical skills (simulated operating theatres). ⋯ A centralized simulation programme that provides training in both technical and non-technical skills is feasible. It is expected to improve the performance of future surgeons in a simulated environment and thus improve patient safety.
-
WHAT'S KNOWN ON THE SUBJECT? AND WHAT DOES THE STUDY ADD?: Multiple treatment alternatives exist for localised prostate cancer, with few high-quality studies directly comparing their comparative effectiveness and costs. The present study is the most comprehensive cost-effectiveness analysis to date for localised prostate cancer, conducted with a lifetime horizon and accounting for survival, health-related quality-of-life, and cost impact of secondary treatments and other downstream events, as well as primary treatment choices. The analysis found minor differences, generally slightly favouring surgical methods, in quality-adjusted life years across treatment options. However, radiation therapy (RT) was consistently more expensive than surgery, and some alternatives, e.g. intensity-modulated RT for low-risk disease, were dominated - that is, both more expensive and less effective than competing alternatives. ⋯ Our analysis found small differences in outcomes and substantial differences in payer and patient costs across treatment alternatives. These findings may inform future policy discussions about strategies to improve efficiency of treatment selection for localised prostate cancer.
-
WHAT'S KNOWN ON THE SUBJECT? AND WHAT DOES THE STUDY ADD?: A significant proportion of patients diagnosed with prostate cancer do not require immediate treatment and could be managed by active surveillance, which usually includes serial measurements of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels and regular biopsies. The rate of rise in PSA levels, which could be calculated as PSA velocity or PSA doubling time, was previously suggested to be associated with the biological aggressiveness of prostate cancer. Although these parameters are obvious candidates for predicting tumour progression in active surveillance patients, earlier studies that examined this topic provided conflicting results. Our analysis showed that PSA velocity and PSA doubling time calculated at different time-points, by different methods, over different intervals, and in different sub-groups of active surveillance patients provide little if any prognostic information. Although we found some significant associations between PSA velocity and the risk of progression as determined by biopsy, the actual clinical significance of this association was small. Furthermore, PSA velocity did not add to the predictive accuracy of total PSA. ⋯ Our findings confirm that PSA kinetics should not be used in decision-making in patients with low-risk prostate cancer managed by active surveillance. Regular surveillance biopsies should remain as the principal method of monitoring cancer progression in these men.