Stephen Fry has opened about his cancer battle with a video on his website.
Writing on Twitter, the 60-year-old explained: "For the last 2 months I've been in the throes of a rather unwelcome and unexpected adventure. I'm sorry I haven't felt able to talk about it till now, but here I am explaining what has been going on."
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He says he went to get a flu jab just before Christmas, but his doctor Tony suggested a general check-up as well. Fry was called the next day after he had semi-heightened PSA levels, which is the hormone produced by the prostate to fight something like a tumour.
After getting an MRI scan and seeing a specialist, he went to get a biopsy of his prostate to see if there was anything sinister lurking.
Unfortunately, there was.
He told the camera: "They took these two bits out of me just to be sure and again another wait and then I get the results the next day and yes indeed there is a cancer there.
"These things are gradient, there's a particular gradient system for prostate cancer, it's called the Gleason score and my score was eight [out of 10] it seemed and that's high enough to warrant some treatment."
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Initial results suggested the cancer hadn't spread yet, but doctors were concerned about the lymph nodes surrounding the prostate and offered two courses of action: radiotherapy or surgically removing the prostate.
Stephen went with option two and surgeons also had to take out 11 lymph nodes, with some turning out to have cancer as well.
"I have been keeping my head down as much as possible because obviously you want to get better without strangers, with the best intentions, sending you all kinds of cards and flowers and letters, because, well, you have to answer them all and I wasn't quite up to that.
"So far as we know it's all been got. Are there greater chances of me getting other kinds of cancer now? Apparently not. But I won't know for sure until I check my PSA levels.
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"Cancer is a word that rings in your head. 'I've got cancer' I kept saying to myself, good heavens. You're not supposed to get cancer. I know it's a cliche but you don't think it's going to happen to you, cancer is something that happens to other people."
He says he was driven to release his video because rumours had been circulating about his health and a newspaper had called to question whether he was, indeed, healthy. Stephen says he wouldn't describe his experience with cancer as a 'battle' because his situation required a bit of surgery and then a bit of monitoring, compared to chemotherapy or radiotherapy that other patients go through.
He used the latter part of his video to encourage men around the world to have their PSA levels checked to ensure they can get on top of cancer early.
More to come.
Topics: Cancer