THURSDAY, Sept. 13 (HealthDay News) -- Although depression affects about one-third of all stroke victims, male stroke survivors are more likely to become depressed than females, a small new study suggests.

The gap may be due to men putting extra stock into the notion that they will enjoy good health, one of the researchers explained.

Many of these male stroke survivors "may be accustomed to, and value highly, being in control of their health," said study author Michael McCarthy, of the University of Cincinnati College of Health Sciences School of Social Work. "For these individuals, loss of control due to infirmity caused by stroke could be perceived as a loss of power and prestige. These losses, in turn, may result in more distress and greater depressive syndromes."

The study, published Sept. 12 in the Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, involved 36 people who had a first stroke within the previous 36 months. Of these stroke survivors, 16 were women and 20 were men.

The researchers assessed the participants' symptoms of depression as well as their ability to perform routine activities, such as bathing and cutting their food. They also examined the amount of uncertainty the survivors had about their health or the outcome of their stroke. The participants were asked to agree or disagree with certain statements, such as "I don't know what's wrong with me," and "I have a lot of questions without answers."

The study revealed that uncertainty about health was strongly associated with greater depression for both men and women. The researchers noted, however, that this link was stronger for the men.

The findings suggest that talking to survivors and their family members in clear, easily understood terms about the patient's health "may be an effective approach for reducing survivor distress and, ultimately, for improving rehabilitation outcomes," McCarthy said in a news release from the journal.

The researchers noted that the study was limited in size and diversity. McCarthy said that future studies with people from various social and economic backgrounds should give more data on how gender and health-related beliefs affect survivor outcomes. More research might also illuminate how women are relatively protected from depression after a stroke, compared to men.

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Mental Health provides more information on stroke and depression.

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 5 (HealthDay News) -- Stop-and-start hormone-deprivation therapy for localized prostate cancer doesn't shorten overall survival compared to continuous treatments, and yields fewer side effects such as impotence and hot flashes, a large new study suggests.

A team of Canadian, British and American researchers found that intermittent hormone treatments -- which suppress circulating male hormones such as testosterone that "feed" prostate tumors -- don't increase the risk of disease progression. Intermittent treatment also doesn't increase the chances that patients whose prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels are slowly rising will eventually die from prostate cancer.

"There has been a lot of work [in this area] over the last two decades, so we figured there would be an improvement in quality of life and hoping there was no detriment to survival," said study author Dr. Juanita Crook, professor of radiation oncology at the University of British Columbia. "That was the one thing that was unknown, but our impression is that people are not dying sooner on intermittent therapy than continuous."

For the study, published Sept. 6 in the New England Journal of Medicine, nearly 1,400 patients whose localized prostate cancer was treated with surgery and/or radiation were split into two groups. One set received continuous hormone-deprivation therapy -- a mainstay treatment for prostate cancer that has spread -- while the rest were treated in eight-month cycles punctuated by months-long "breaks" depending on their PSA levels.

Slowly rising PSA levels may indicate the progression of prostate cancer, even if no evidence of the disease shows up on other tests such as MRI and CT scans. Study participants on stop-and-start hormone-deprivation treatments were placed back on therapy if their PSA scores grew to 10 or higher, or they experienced clinical symptoms of disease progression, Crook said.

After a follow-up of nearly seven years, only 14.2 percent of all participants had died from prostate cancer, with an overall survival of 8.8 years in the intermittent-therapy group and 9.1 years in the continuous-therapy set.

Side effects associated with hormone-deprivation therapy, such as erectile dysfunction, hot flashes, bone loss and depression, were less common among the intermittent treatment group, Crook said.

"There were many quality-of-life benefits to intermittent therapy, despite a similar overall survival," Crook said. "Even if they didn't regain erectile function ... they had less fatigue and improved urinary function, which were very important to them as well."

Those on intermittent therapy had one-third of the treatments of the continuous therapy group, she added. "So there's a very significant cost savings ... with improved quality of life and no overall loss of survival," she said. "It's a triple win."

Dr. Louis Potters, chairman of radiation medicine at North Shore-LIJ Health System in New Hyde Park, N.Y., said the study will help him structure conversations with some of his prostate cancer patients who face similar treatment choices.

"We need to now focus on [learning] the optimal timing of the initiation of this treatment," he said. "Because it's clear that patients aren't necessarily going to die in droves if they have a recurrence following primary treatment. The question is, When do they need to start this type of therapy?"

Crook noted that her study wasn't designed to answer that question, which could take many more years of research, but contended that the current evidence demonstrates that intermittent hormone therapy can become the standard of care for patients like those studied.

"Intermittent therapy can't be used just arbitrarily," she said. "[Clinicians] need to follow a template and a schedule, and this is the one we have experience with. People have to be very careful in their interpretation of the study and the application of results."

More information

The American Cancer Society offers more information about hormone therapy for prostate cancer  .