Looking fit after traveling some 2,900 miles on diplomatic business in four countries over eight days, Secretary of State Colin Powell still looks back on his successful prostate cancer surgery as carrying an important message for all males.
"Detect prostate cancer early," Powell says. Otherwise, If you don't, "it will kill you."
And the younger you are, the more aggressively the cancer will grow, Powell said Tuesday in an interview on the PBS-TV Tavis Smiley show.
African-Americans have to be more careful, and have more examinations on a regular basis to detect the disease as early as possible, Powell said. "That's just a fact of life."
"We are at a higher risk to prostate cancer than our white brothers," Powell said. "It's well-known. It's documented."
But, he said, all men are at risk.
Powell's experience bears out how elusive prostate cancer can be.
Referring to a test given routinely to men at about 50 and usually to African Americans a few years earlier, Powell said that a test about six years ago showed that his Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) level was high.
He had two biopsies in the late 1990s that did not detect cancer, he said. Last August, with the PSA level still elevated, he had a "very intrusive biopsy" at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the tumor was found.
Out of 13 samples, only one showed the cancer.
Powell elected surgery over radiation and other options.
"Nobody likes to have surgery," he said. "And, believe it or not, even though I am 67 years old, until that operation last December I had never spent one day or night in a hospital. I've been in remarkably good health."
Suddenly, to hear you have cancer and it's got to be removed "is a little unnerving," Powell said. "But you have got to face it."
Seven months later, Powell still describes himself as recovering from surgery.
But, he said, "I'm doing great."
