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Producers urged to get tested

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Published: April 5, 2013

Go to the Lacombe Bull Sale to buy a bull and get a prostate cancer blood test.

Graham Sharp, president of the Lacombe Agricultural Society and co-sale manager of the Lacombe Bull Sale in Lacombe, Alta., said the society has lost too many men to prostate cancer in recent years and wants to take a proactive role in prostate cancer prevention.

“Prostate cancer has cost us at least two of our directors in the last five or six years and one of the caretakers at the ag ground,” said Sharp.

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“We wanted to do something for the community.”

The sale committee invited the Prostate Cancer Centre’s mobile Man Van to the April 9 bull sale to make it easier for men to get tested for prostate cancer.

Nurses at the mobile testing clinic will take PSA blood tests in the motor home from men attending the bull sale.

The prostate-specific antigen test measures the amount of PSA in the blood. PSA levels are often elevated in men with prostate cancer.

“Our belief is the key to curing cancer is early detection before it has spread anywhere else,” said Sharp.

Farmers and ranchers buying bulls at the sale are the same demographic that should be tested for prostate cancer.

“The bull sale crowd is 75 or 80 percent male and the bulk of them are over 40,” he said.

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