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----------------------------------------------------------------------- Testosterone could point to prostate risk ----------------------------------------------------------------------- WASHINGTON (October 13, 1997 1:34 p.m. EDT http://www.nando.net) - Men with narrow shoulders and some men who start going bald early may be at higher risk of prostate cancer, U.S. researchers said on Monday. Wendy Demark-Wahnefried and colleagues at Duke University in North Carolina said they had found links between testosterone levels and prostate risk, although they had not been able to conclusively link baldness and shoulder width with the disease. Baldness has long been linked with high testosterone levels and Demark-Wahnefried's group was trying to find a link among baldness, testosterone levels in youth and prostate cancer. "It is hypothesized that hormone levels throughout life -- ranging from in utero (in the womb) to old age -- drive such events as skeletal and muscle formation, fat deposition and baldness, and that these events may provide the initial stimuli and promotion for prostate cancer," Demark-Wahnefried said in a statement. "By studying the tell-tale signs that hormones leave on the body, our goal was to clearly separate those men at risk for prostate cancer from those who are not." Writing in the Journal of Andrology, they said they found a link between high testosterone levels and vertex baldness -- the kind that causes a bald patch on the top of the head. They studied more than 300 men, half who had prostate cancer, aged between 50 and 70. They found a nearly doubled increase in the risk of prostate cancer among men who had high levels of "free" testosterone -- the kind that cells can take up and use easily. But they were not able to make the third connection, showing that baldness and prostate cancer were linked. Demark-Wahnefried said she thought they were, however, and wanted to look next at men who started balding by 40. In a second study, published in the Journal of Nutrition and Cancer, her team said they found men with prostate cancer tended to have narrower shoulders in proportion to the rest of their bodies. The difference was very small -- less than a centimeter (half an inch). Demark-Wahnefried cited earlier studies that showed men who went through puberty later tended to have broader shoulders, and said this suggested hormone levels at puberty influenced shoulder span. She said this was evidence that prostate cancer was influenced by hormones early in life -- maybe as early as when a male child is still in the womb. REUTERS Reut12:28 10-13-9 Copyright 1997 Nando.net Copyright 1997 Reuters <http://www.nando.net/newsroom/ntn/health/101397/health25_22654_noframes.html> ----------------------------------------------------------------------- [log in to unmask]