Understanding Prostate Cancer Survival Rates

About one in every eight men will get diagnosed with prostate cancer. While it tends to be less aggressive and has a higher survival rate than some other cancer types, every person and every cancer is different. Your outlook will depend on many factors, including your cancer's stage at diagnosis. Survival rates based on your prostate cancer's stage can give you some idea about your prognosis. But they can't tell you how long you'll live.

When it comes to determining your outlook with prostate cancer, doctors use a staging system called TNM, which stands for tumor, nodes, and metastasis. This system considers:

• The tumor's size
• How many lymph nodes it has reached, if any
• Whether it has metastasized (spread) to other parts of the body

In staging your prostate cancer, your doctor will also consider the levels of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) in your bloodstream. By looking at your cancer cells under a microscope, they can give it a Gleason score, too. This score tells them how fast your cancer is likely to grow and spread.

It's easiest to fully remove, or cure, cancers when they're diagnosed at an early stage, meaning that the cancer hasn't spread outside your prostate. Even then, sometimes prostate cancer comes back after treatment. But thanks to treatment advances, men are living longer with more advanced or metastatic prostate cancer today than ever before.

Prostate cancer is most often diagnosed after age 65. In part because it's often slow growing, about seven in 10 prostate cancers are detected before they've spread outside the prostate. The five-year relative survival for all prostate cancers is 97.9%. But it's important to note that survival rates drop if the cancer is detected only after it has spread, or metastasized.

Most prostate cancers are diagnosed when they are either localized or regional, meaning they have not spread beyond the prostate or nearby lymph nodes. The five-year survival rate when your prostate cancer is diagnosed in this early stage – before it has spread to more distant parts of the body – is 100%. Overall, 83% of prostate cancer cases are diagnosed at this stage and come with an extremely positive outlook. 

In 8% of men, prostate cancer is diagnosed only after it has spread more distantly in the body. For advanced or metastatic prostate cancer, the five-year relative survival rate is 37.9%. Sometimes a prostate cancer's stage isn't known. It's important to talk to your doctor about testing to determine your prostate cancer's stage and what the results mean for your treatment and outlook. 

Remember that survival rates don't predict the outcome for you or any other person who has prostate cancer. They're based on averages over time for large groups of men who've had prostate cancer in the past. They don't take into account your overall health, individual response to treatment, or recent treatment advances.

A cancer diagnosis is always scary. But it may help to know that almost everyone diagnosed with prostate cancer will survive at least five years. Many people diagnosed with prostate cancer live even longer. The 10-year relative survival rate with prostate cancer is 98%. Ninety-five percent of men diagnosed with prostate cancer will live 15 years or more beyond the diagnosis.

At least one in five prostate cancers come back within five years of initial treatment, which will affect your survival odds. Your chances of recurrence will depend on your cancer's stage and how aggressively or fast it grows. After treatment, your doctor can monitor you for recurrence using a PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood test. Ask your care team about your likelihood of recurrence and what kind of monitoring you'll need after treatment.

There's a lot you can do to improve your health as a prostate cancer survivor or person living with prostate cancer. See your care team for regular follow-up care. Healthy living, including a balanced diet and regular exercise, will help keep you strong with age. There's some evidence that people with a healthy lifestyle are more likely to survive prostate cancer. Ask your doctor about steps you can take to protect your long-term health after prostate cancer.