Hormone therapy: an overview.

Hormonal treatment of prostate cancer has advanced little in the past 20 years. Total androgen ablation may offer a 20% survival advantage when compared with monotherapy, as might the use of stilboestrol if its cardiovascular side-effects could be abolished with aspirin or some other agent. Neither approach, however, is likely to lead to a cure. Currently available cytotoxic chemotherapy appears to offer little survival advantage. There is an urgent need for the development of other treatments.