Mike Schikman:
Very pleased to have a first time guest, retired JMU professor, Dr. Jim Kidd. Dr. Kidd knew something was wrong when his prostate specific antigen, his PSA test came back abnormal, even though his MRI showed no signs of prostate cancer. Dr. Kidd had a prostate cancer biopsy five years earlier using what is called the “transrectal approach” where a needle is passed numerous times through the rectum to take samples of a prostate. His prostate showed no signs of cancer at the time. And it’s a pretty intense procedure! Dr. Kidd did his research and found a gentleman named Dr. Matthew J Allaway, a urologist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s, Urology Associates, in Cumberland, Maryland. Dr. Allaway created a safer and better biopsy approach called “PrecisionPoint Transperineal Access System”. Dr. Jim Kidd, welcome to The Mike Schikman Show. It’s an honor to have you!

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Thank you. I appreciate it.

Mike Schikman:
We were reminiscing: Dr. Kidd, started at JMU the year before Dr. Carrier came, and talk about being in ‘the eye of the hurricane’! That was basically it for you and everybody else. Amazing, amazing situation.

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Yes, it was: it was amazing! You can imagine doing time-lapse photos of those years. You wouldn’t believe things could move as quickly as it did on that campus! There wasn’t one year that I was there, that something wasn’t being built or remodeled.

Mike Schikman:
And that was about right! When I first came to JMU in 1979 and, compared to now, it’s like, Holy Cow!… It’s totally different now. So what made you think you had a prostate cancer problem?

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Well, in your introduction, I think you said it was about five years ago, I had my first biopsy. I think was actually more like three years, which wasn’t that far back. As with most aging men, occasionally, you take a look at your PSA and over the years, mine had been relatively small, I think the numbers, maybe twos and threes. As time went on, it kinda began working its way up the numbers. And I think it would have probably been closer to 8 or 10 when my urologist felt that we needed to take a look and see what was going on. So he did, as you explained on the introduction.

Mike Schikman:
That ‘transrectal’ sounds very painful.

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Well, in both cases when I’ve had a biopsy, I said, “you gonna put me under,” because I’ve talked to people who have had that done. And they said, “it is not a pleasant experience”. So I had decided to have the “not pleasant experience” under general anesthetic. And it’s not that bad. It’s almost like Twilight Sleep. You just don’t realize what’s going on. The biopsy was encouraging because there was no sign of cancer. And so I went on my way and about a year later, or two years later, my doctor says “your PSA is up to 20”. Wow! So that had almost doubled in just a year or two. My urologist had left the area, and I thought, well… I want to look into this, so I could understand all the options. I was looking for a urologist who could do what I thought was “a more contemporary approach”. And that is the perineal approach, where they don’t go through the rectum. They go through the perineum, which is the distance between the scrotum and the anus. And that’s much cleaner, as you can imagine, a much cleaner area to go through, PLUS it doesn’t have the possible side effects that you can get with infection from the transrectal. After some research, I found Dr. Matthew Allaway, in Cumberland, Maryland. I was hoping for something a little closer to home, and when I looked at Dr. Allaway’s website, it said he had trained doctors all over the country. He had done training at UVA, and I decided to go to UVA for the whole procedure. When I spoke with Dr. Allaway about that, he said although he had trained the people at UVA, they hadn’t started doing the procedure yet. (Side note: I just talked to Dr. Allaway three or four days ago, and he said that UVA has begun to do the perineal approach). But at that time, they didn’t do it yet. And so I told my urologist at UVA that I was going to go up to Cumberland MD and have it done. And she was very pleased with it, because Dr.Allaway had done training for them, but they were not ready to start it yet. Anyway, I went up to Cumberland, and Dr. Allaway looked at my MRI, which didn’t show any cancer. So here I am, with an early biopsy than didn’t show cancer, and I’ve got an MRI that didn’t show cancer. But they say: you get the MRI, but you also still have to have the biopsy. So I went up to see Dr. Alloway, and he said “well, Jim, I don’t think you have cancer, but we’re going to do a biopsy using the perineal approach”. And so I had the biospy, under general anesthetic, there wasn’t anything to it. A few days later, he called me. He said, “well, I’ve got bad news for you. He said, the bad news is… we did find the cancer. I think it was anterior part, the hardest part for a needle to get to. He said it was pretty aggressive, and pretty serious.

Mike Schikman:
A PSA of 20 is huge!

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Yes it is. I’ve had doctors tell me they’ve had PSA’s of over a hundred from patients, but, sometimes at PSA is is affected more by the size of the prostate. Interestingly enough, he found the cancer even though there was nothing on the MRI, because of his approach, which called a PrecisionPoint™. He has an instrument that when he passes a needle through it, the needle goes a certain place, and he knows exactly where that needle is. Dr. Allaway had to go behind my pubic bone, because my prostate was the size of a small grapefruit. If you don’t know anything about the prostate, it’s supposed to be the size of a walnut. So there’s something to be thinking about! Dr. Allaway said since he was able to get up there with his PrecisionPoint™ approach, he was able to find the cancer. I listened to him give a lecture to another person about this: typically, the ‘transrectal approach’ cannot do that. In my case, going through the rectum would be too painful and too disruptive, to put a needle up there, where he put his needle in me. So, he found the cancer and then I came back to UVA. They said, well, the procedure now is to start on radiation. They also give you a pill, which stops the development of testosterone, because the prostate cancer grows on testosterone, and they have to stop that. So I was on that for a number of weeks, and then they started radiation. This is my last week! 28 days of going over to UVA and hopping up on their gurney. It takes about 10 or12 minutes, and that’s all there is to it. I’m just so thankful Dr. Allaway was able to find the cancer. After it’s over, I guess we’ll just sort of do a “waiting thing” and see what happens.,

Mike Schikman:
Well, this is important to me. I have an older brother who had prostate cancer. He was, very fortunately, working at Sloan Kettering in New York.

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Oh my goodness!

Mike Schikman:
So that’s a pretty good place: if you’re going to have ‘a cancer’ of any kind, Sloan Kettering is a pretty good place to be. But it is a very scary situation, because, like a lot of problems, you can’t see it.

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Yes. That’s right.

Mike Schikman:
And in your case it was “hiding”.

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Yes. And that’s what is scary: the thought that you ‘might have it’. And a sidebar here: I tell everybody I know who is going to have a biopsy: “you don’t want to have that transrectal biopsy”. You want the best thing that they have. I think the transrectal biopsies are going out of fashion. Dr. Allaway said, in some countries (I think in England?) they don’t even pay for the biopsy, or they pay much less for them now. Because with that transrectal approach, they can only get, I think, the bottom half of the prostate. Mine was way up in the inner side, up high, behind the pubic bone. And if you’re going to have a biopsy, I think you want to make sure that you have the very best kind of biopsy you can get! So I was very fortunate to have found Dr. Allaway.

Mike Schikman:
It is Dr. Allaway’s PrecisionPoint™ system a lot more in use now?

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Yes! Ever since I’ve known him, almost every time I get in touch with him, he’s getting on a plane and going someplace to educate. He does a lot of training, both individuals and clinics, about what this approach does. He told me he’s in, oh, probably a dozen or two countries. And the last time I talked to him, I think he said he was in the majority of cancer clinics, like, of the top 25 cancer clinics, I think he said he was in 24 of them, or something like that.

Mike Schikman:
We are talking to Dr. Jim Kidd. September is National Prostate Cancer Awareness Month, and Dr. Kidd has joined us to talk about his interactions with the new PrecisionPoint™ biopsy. And that it’s becoming more and more common. And you can talk to your GP and /or cancer doctor about using this PrecisionPoint™ system. Is that the right thing to do?

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Exactly. I spoke to Dr. Allaway about a week ago, and he said UVA has now started using the PrecisionPoint™ procedure in their Urology Clinic.

Mike Schikman:
That sounds promising. It really does! Dr. Jim Kidd, keep in touch, let us know how you’re doing.

Dr. Jim Kidd:
Okay. I’d be glad to do that.

Mike Schikman:
And God Bless you and thank you very much for sharing an intimate problem, and how you dealt with it. And, thank you for the information!

Dr. Jim Kidd:
You’re very welcome. Good to talk to you!