Dr. Morris on the role of active surveillance in prostate cancer management

In this video, David S. Morris, MD, FACS, recaps a session from the 2023 LUGPA Annual Meeting titled, “Best Practices for Active Surveillance”. Morris is the president and co-director of the advanced therapeutics center and research departments at Urology Associates in Nashville, Tennessee.

Video Transcript:

What were the key take-home messages from this session?

I think the takeaway from the active surveillance [session] is that we've increased the utilization of active surveillance for low-risk appropriate men. I think urology as a whole needs to continue to push that agenda in low-risk men who probably benefit most from avoiding some of the side effects of therapy. [In] the intermediate-risk men, it’s more of a shared decision-making model about delaying therapy vs aggressive upfront treatment. All our tools, including genomics and MRI enable us to do a better job of risk stratifying to have a more appropriate shared decision-making discussion.

How does genomic testing help drive decisions regarding active surveillance?

I think most of the panel members felt that genomics would help in the lowest risk men as more of a confirmation to help with the comfort level of a patient and a physician accepting that their risk is actually that low and putting it in a concrete manner. For the intermediate-risk men where their risk profile could fall either into the lower or higher risk categories, genomics can sometimes help nudge that risk one way or the other and can make people feel more confident in the decision. Or it can actually shift the direction of the discussion from surveillance into active treatment or vice versa.

This transcription has been edited for clarity.