Can endocrine drug therapy be interrupted or stopped in patients with prostate cancer?

Generally, patients with prostate cancer who need endocrine therapy are mostly locally advanced or metastatic cases. Endocrine therapy works by using drugs to lower the levels of male hormones in the patient's body, thereby preventing the proliferation and development of prostate cancer cells. However, studies have shown that some prostate cancer cells can continue to survive despite very low androgen levels.

Some tumor cells with a high degree of malignancy will continue to develop.This is the main reason why on the basis of endocrine therapy, there are still some prostate cancer patients whose condition will recur or even progress. Therefore, in this case, once endocrine therapy is interrupted or stopped, some prostate cancer patients will soon have a rebound of PSA levels, suggesting that some tumor cells have re-entered the active development state, and the threat to the patient's prognosis is significantly increased.

In our clinical work, we have also observed that some patients have delayed or stopped endocrine drug therapy due to the epidemic and other reasons, and in the subsequent follow-up visits, it was indeed found that the disease had progressed. Therefore, it is generally not recommended to interrupt or stop endocrine therapy for prostate cancer patients who receive endocrine therapy regularly.