It's one of the most common cancers in men, but now new medical advances and a new celebrity voice are bringing awareness to prostate cancer and hope to those living with it.
This week Ben Stiller spoke for the first time about his battle with prostate cancer on the Today Show.
"Cancer-free as of today," Stiller said. "You know anyone who as cancer you know you just have to keep checking but I'm really fortunate."
Not all men diagnosed with the disease are as fortunate.
Jerry Benson has been living with prostate cancer for 11 years, keeping it suppressed with treatment that can sometimes make doing everyday things challenging. But now a new clinical trial is changing that.
"In my daily workout routine I'm lifting more weights building more muscles feeling better about myself just have much more energy," Benson says. "It's brought back what I had 15 years ago before I got this disease."
Benson is in a trial that treats men who have advanced prostate cancer with high doses of testosterone, which is usually suppressed in patients to keep the cancer from spreading.
Dr. Thomas Flaig at University of Colorado Health is Benson's doctor and is overseeing the trial. He says clinical trials have drastically transformed treatment of prostate cancer in the last decade.
"When I look at the way I treat men standardly now that come to me in clinic with advanced disease it's usually with drugs that we developed together along with a lot of other academic centers across the country in the last 10 years," Dr. Flaig says. "And I see all the good that those things are doing."
Benson says he's proof. But participation in the trial, isn't just about him.
"The big thing is it helps people behind us," Benson says. "I mean I've got a son grandson probably more hopefully down that line and everybody wants to help everybody in this situation is a good way to do that."
The clinical trial is going on nationwide and you can still participate. Prostate cancer is the most common cancer among men in the United States aside from non-melanoma skin cancer. One in seven will be diagnosed with it during their lifetime.
