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New guidelines issued by American urologists have suggested that the drug finasteride, commonly used to fight hair loss in men under the name Propecia,is also effective in combating prostate cancer. The American Society of Clinical Oncology and the American Urological Association have said that after a phase III randomised trial, the evidence was that finasteride reduced the chances of someone contracting prostate cancer by 25%.

The results are based on data gathered from the Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial, which studied 18,882 healthy men aged over 55. In a strange paradox, the results showed that while men who did not have the cancer dramatically reduced their chances of getting it, amongst men who did or had already developed the cancer, the tumours were more likely to be high-grade.

However during a year of analysis of the results, the researchers discovered that the medication was not making the tumours high-grade, but was rather making them easier to detect by shrinking the prostate. The researchers said they believed the myth that finasteride caused the cancer had now been debunked.

The lead researcher on the study Barnett Kramer said not enough research had yet been done to see how cost effective it would be to take finasteride as preventative measure. He said it would depend on whether American health care insurance providers would cover the cost. He also said that more needed to be discovered about whether a low dose of the medication would also be effective and whether the drug impacts on prostate cancer mortality.