Hormonal Therapy-Detailed
Hormonal therapy prevents cancer cells from getting the male hormones they need to grow. It is called systemic therapy because it can affect cancer cells throughout the body. Systemic therapy is used to treat cancer that has spread. Sometimes this type of therapy is used to try to prevent the cancer from coming back after surgery or radiation treatment.
There are several forms of hormonal therapy:
Orchiectomy is surgery to remove the testicles, the main source of male hormones.
Drugs known as luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone (LH-RH) agonists can prevent the testicles from producing testosterone. Examples of these drugs are leuprolide, goserelin and buserelin.
Drugs known as antiandrogens can block the action of androgens, a male sex hormone. Two examples are flutamide and bicalutamide.
Drugs that can prevent the adrenal glands from making androgens include ketoconazole and aminoglutethimide.
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