'I was complacent about the risk from prostate cancer'

Research shows that 69 per cent of Black adults are unaware that Black men have twice the risk of developing the disease. Nadine White hears from some of those who have survived it

- Nadine White

Prostate cancer survivor Brian Quavar was told by his GP he was “more likely to be hit by a bus” than die after a diagnosis, so he didn’t take the heightened risk for Black men seriously.

Black men are twice as likely to develop the condition, but poor guidance from the doctor meant that the 61-year-old became “complacent” and declined to undergo further tests to interrogate symptoms of the disease when they first appeared in 2016. A blood test revealed elevated prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels, which is a potential sign of prostate cancer. Mr Quavar was offered a biopsy to further test this, but he declined it because of the risk of infection.

Mr Quavar, a father of four, told The Independent: “Based on the odds of me being affected adversely by prostate cancer and putting myself at direct risk of infection with this biopsy, I told them ‘No, thank you.’ I didn’t like the risk involved.” Encouraged by the support of his partner in 2021, Brian got his PSA level retested with his GP. The test showed it had increased further, resulting in a prostate cancer diagnosis and the removal of his prostate gland.

“The conversation with my GP made me overly complacent,” Brian, a train driver on the London Underground, continued. “I didn’t think I was going to die from prostate cancer. So the risk was far out of my mind.

“With the knowledge I have now, what I’m finding is there isn’t enough research to understand how aggressive prostate cancer is in Black men. A lot of the research is on white bodies. So my GP’s statement might have been coming from the lens of how the cancer presents in the general population, or white men; that is where we need to have more research.”