Mission, Goals and Facts

Our Mission:
The Boston Prostate Cancer Walk's mission is to benefit prostate cancer research in Massachusetts and to prevent advanced prostate cancer through education and early detection.

Our Goals are:
  -  raise money for research for the treatment and cure of prostate cancer.
  -  increase the awareness of prostate cancer.

Our goals for the Boston Prostate Cancer Walk 2009 are to raise $250,000 for prostate cancer research, and to further increase awareness.

Some Prostate Cancer Facts:
We believe there is an urgent need to meet these goals based on these facts:

• A man is diagnosed with prostate cancer in the U.S. every 2.3 minutes. (230,000 new cases a year)
   
• A man dies every 16 minutes in the U.S. from prostate cancer. (32,500) deaths a year)
   
• The greatest number of new prostate cancer cases are in men between 48 and 59 years of age.
   
• About 30,000 men in Massachusetts, and two million in the United States have prostate cancer
   
• Prostate Cancer is the most inherited of all cancers. The son of a man with prostate cancer has twice the risk of having prostate cancer. The brother of a man with prostate cancer is 4.9 times more likely to get the disease.
   
• Statistically, about about 40% to 50% of men who were treated with radiation, and about 40% to 50% of men who were told their cancer was confined within their prostate, and had surgery, will have a rising PSA within about 5 years. They, and the men whose cancers were not confined within the prostate, or who have a high Gleason Score, or a rapidly rising PSA, have a serious problem, and will require advanced treatment. Prostate Cancer is not yet fully curable.
   
• Seven American and Canadian medical organizations say that about 50% of men diagnosed with prostate cancer, do not need to be treated. This includes the American Medical Association.
   
• Due to the budget cuts, Massachusetts has eliminated ALL state funding for Prostate Cancer research. AIDS research receives more than $2 billion in federal dollars. Breast cancer research will receive about $900 million next year. Compare that to $438 million for prostate cancer research. It's not that research for other diseases receives too much funding. Prostate cancer receives too little.