Richard Lee, MD, PhD, Clinical Co-Director: Claire and John Bertucci Center for Genitourinary Cancers at Mass General Cancer Center, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School, provided a presentation about treatments for multiple types and stages of prostate cancer at the third session of PHEN’s 2025 African American Prostate Cancer Disparity Summit. He first discussed the types of prostate cancers including metastatic disease. He defined numerous complex medical terms to help patients better understand this condition.

Dr. Lee also went over the history of how prostate cancer treatments have advanced since 2010 when surgery, radiation, ADT, and castration-resistant therapies were the most common. Since then, many new treatments have become available. He spoke about biochemical recurrence, which is when a man’s PSA level may keep rising but no visible cancer exists yet.

“When patients have a PSA doubling time of less than nine months, that means the PSA is rising relatively rapidly. They’re the men at high risk of progression and increase risk of PCSM (Prostate Cancer Specific Mortality),” explained Dr. Lee. “Most of those men are managed with hormone therapy.”

He went on to discuss the EMBARK trial for patients with a high PSA doubling time, which showed that metastasis-free survival improved when patients received enzalutamide with leuprolide as compared to leuprolide alone. New findings have shown that adding breakthrough treatments, like docetaxel or abiraterone, to ADT can help men live longer. Lastly, Dr. Lee answered audience questions about his presentation.