Advice on Cancer tests treatments and how to support the family please

[mummyhill]

My father in law has been told that he has prostate cancer and they are looking to see if it is anywhere else. He has lost three stone in a very short time and is severley depressed as is mil and sil and of cause dh. Any information or advice would be welcome.

prostrate cancer if caught in time has a very good success rate of treatment... I know several of my Dad's friends have had it and not all had surgery -- all of them are fine several years on... so it might not be as bad as you might imagine.... although the worry will be massive..

Have a google for BACUP, they have excellent information. Treatment can be radiotherapy, surgery or drug treatment.....not the usual chemotherapy but rather hormone treatment that suppresses the growth of the tumour. Most men with PC die of something else. Most men over 80 have it but few of them dies of it.

The main problem is that they seem to think that there is cancer else where as well we are waiting for an appointment to come through for a ct scan. It is really hard to see people that i love nearly as much as my own parents going through such a hard time and not knowing what to do to support them.

It is very hard, my dad had PC and very sadly he died of it.

The CT scan will help to pick up any secondaries, which often crop up in the bone in the region. Even with regional spread treatment is still given, with radiotherapy for suppression of the secondaries in the bone and hormone treatment for the primary.

If it come to it I would always recoment the Macmillan nurses who were wonderful with my father and also give the rest of the family a massive ampount of support. I hope it doesn't come to it, but good paliative care in available, which invludes treatment for depression. My father had a good quality of life right up until he died and was still doing all the things he loved the day before.

Hugs to you, this is awful to deal with.

It has all been causing huge problems with his diabetes. He has had quite a few hypos recently, they have adjusted his insullin and told us he shouldn't have another hypo but that he might still have vague moments as they suspect that there is a restriction to the blood flow to his head which makes us wonder just how bad the situation is, we still have another 3 weeks to wait before we can complain that they are not working fast enough on this according to the waiting time lists at the hospital. It doesn't help that his brother died of cancer last year. I just feel so helpless what can i do to help them other than make sure they get to spend all the time they want with DD?

Have had mil here in tears for an hour this morning before fil turned up and sat in the corner staring at the wall. Sil came over and took them and dd out for a bit. I just feel hopeless as i don't know what to say or do other than make loads of cups of tea and give them a hug.

Ohh god he is still losing weight he has gone down to a size 34 trouser from a 36 in approx i week. He is thinner than his son now. He won't go out or do anything seems really confused and basically apears unable to look after himself mental health team are comming out to asses him now as well. I worry about how much more of this the family can take.