Current Screening Might Miss Prostate Cancer in Transgender Women [Video]

Key Takeaways

Screening could miss early-stage prostate cancer in transgender womenEstrogen supplements can cause PSA levels to be 50 times lower in transgender women than cisgender menThis means guidelines used in PSA tests could miss early prostate cancers

MONDAY, July 1, 2024 (HealthDay News) — Current screening standards could miss early-stage prostate cancer in transgender women, a new study warns.

Prostate cancer tests look for prostate-specific antigen (PSA), a protein produced by the small gland. Blood levels of PSA tend to be elevated in people with prostate cancer.

But the estrogen that many transgender women take as part of their gender-affirming care “drastically lowers PSA levels, which could mean the threshold we are using as ‘normal’ is too high to detect early-stage cancer in these patients,” said senior researcher Dr. Stephen Freedland, chair of prostate cancer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

Current guidelines hold that PSA levels above 4 nanograms per milliliter …