When travel writer Rick Steves, 70, switched insurance providers, he visited a new doctor, who suggested Steves undergo a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test. Steves agreed.
“He called me two days later and said, ‘You’ve got a serious problem. You’ve got a PSA of 55 and you’ve got prostate cancer,’” Steves tells TODAY.com. “It was all hands on deck to change over to: How are we going to address that prostate?”
Having a PSA level over 10 increases one’s likelihood of having prostate cancer, says the American Cancer Society. Steves says he wants to share his story to increase awareness of PSA testing and prostate cancer.
“If I can help people be more mindful and smart with their health, especially as they get into the age that I’m at, that’s a beautiful thing to do with my celebrity,” he says. “Talk about it. Say the word prostate cancer. Demystify it. That’s really important so that people can be comfortable talking about something a lot of people think is private.”
‘Feeling So Good’
Hearing the news in August 2024 was shocking to Steves because he felt healthy and had spoken to his doctor about how he could continue to travel and embrace life.
“I was feeling so good. 69 years old, looking at 70, feeling great,” he says. “We were talking about wellness, and diet, and exercise and how to enjoy the next years and be really healthy.”
His previous doctor never spoke to him about PSA testing, so finding out the diagnosis now was “just dumb luck.” Immediately, Steves wanted to know how to treat his cancer.
“The focus went from wellness to survival really,” he says. “I knew I had access to good medical care, and I was determined to be a good patient and deal with it one step at a time and play the cards I’m dealt.”
Steves, who believes he had an early-stage prostate cancer, opted for a prostatectomy, a surgical procedure where doctors remove the entire prostate.
“I just hoped and prayed it was contained in my prostate with a good margin,” he says. “Psychologically, I felt like I got to get this prostate out of my body, and that was what my surgeon recommended also.”
In September 2024, he underwent surgery, knowing he might experience side effects of incontinence and erectile dysfunction.
“I thought, ‘Well, I’m going to get rid of the cancer first and I’ll deal with those side effects later,’” he says. “The happiest ending would be to get rid of that thing.”
Recovery went well and, luckily, the side effects from having his prostate removed did not stop him from traveling.
“When you’re in the middle of the incontinence, it feels like it’s going to last forever,” Steves says. “It’s pretty miserable.”
But his doctors and others who went through prostate cancer treatment assured him that if he was patient, it would resolve. And it did.
“After three months, I was just fine,” he says.
Several months after surgery, Steves underwent another PSA test to see if doctors had removed all the cancer.
“The psychological thing for me was it was really strange to be in the waiting stage,” he says. “You’re helpless. You don’t know what your new PSA is going to be. Did they get it all? Or is it still raging in your body?”
Following surgery, his first PSA reading was 0.09, then it went to 0.03.
“The doctor said you can consider yourself cancer-free,” he says. “That’s the good news.”
Prostate Cancer
In early September, the American Cancer Society (ACS) published Prostate Cancer Statistics, 2025 in the journal CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians that showed that rates of the cancer are increasing.
“One thing that’s concerning about the increase in incidents is not only simply the numbers are going up, but we’re seeing an increase in the number of men who are presenting with more advanced and distant disease,” Dr. William Dahut, chief scientific officer of ACS and one of the paper’s authors, tells TODAY.com.
Distant disease is the kind that spreads to other parts of the body, also referred to as metastatic or Stage 4 cancer.
“Distant disease remains an incurable cancer, and so that’s what is particularly concerning because more patients with a more advanced disease appear to be driving the increase in incidence.”
The report notes that from 2007 through 2017, rates of prostate cancer declined by 6.4% annually. From 2014 through 2021, it increased by 3% every year.
Dahut says there’s multiple things driving this increase. One issue is that PSA screenings declined after the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force said the testing did “more harm than good,” in 2012.
“There was a dramatic fall in men who had PSA testing,” Dahut says.
Six years later, that decision was revised and it’s now recommended that men between 55 and 70 talk to their doctors about PSA testing, what’s known as informed decision making. Some men should undergo screening because of family history or past abnormal blood testing, while others might not need to check their PSA levels often. But this can be confusing. Today, the percentage of men undergoing PSA screening is low, Dahut adds.
“If you look at the history of prostate cancer clinically, you know it can be indolent for years and years, then over time it can evolve to where the cancer is more aggressive and ultimately spread,” Dahut says. “It’s not surprising if screening went down and then over time you would see more men presenting with more advanced disease.”
Dahut notes that other causes can play a role in increasing rates, such as environmental factors, diet and lack of exercise, for example.
Prostate cancer does not have any symptoms until later stages.
“Symptoms generally occur when the cancer has spread. If it has spread into the bladder, you might get blood in your urine,” Dahut says. “If it spreads to the bones or elsewhere, you have pain, or fatigue, or weight loss.”
Treatment for prostate cancer can include observation, a prostatectomy, radiation and testosterone blocking, also called hormone therapy. Some people diagnosed with early-stage prostate cancer could only ever need observation, which has advanced as MRI technology has improved.
“Some men’s cancer never progresses,” Dahut says. “Men sometimes will opt for treatment because there’s anxiety knowing that there’s a cancer.”
With prostate cancer, there’s a strong “familial component,” which means knowing one’s family history can be important.
“People are probably not aware of the importance of family history and when one should be screened for prostate cancer,” Dahut says. “It’s not discussed that much. And if you have a strong family history of prostate cancer, you should probably begin discussing screening at age 40, for example.”
‘Be Open’ About Prostate Cancer
Since being diagnosed, Steves has met many cancer survivors.
“What’s astonishing to me or remarkable to me is how secretive it is — unless you’re a member, then people are forthcoming,” he says. “I had friends of mine and work colleagues (who) had prostate cancer, and I never knew. They were very good at keeping it a secret, and that’s the norm.”
Steves didn’t want to keep his diagnosis to himself.
“I feel like people need to be open about what’s going on in their lives, and people care,” he says. “I feel it’s very important for people to be tuned into their bodies.”
He admits that his busy schedule meant he became “sloppy” with his health and hopes that others take theirs seriously.
“I was too busy to be tested,” he says. “I was too busy to care.”
Since undergoing prostate cancer treatment, Steves feels a lot of gratitude for the doctors and cancer researchers who helped him have a positive outcome.
“I wouldn’t be here without research,” he says. “We need to embrace the value of medical research, and we need to fund it.”
He “marvels” at the advances that helped him continue traveling and sharing with others.
“I’m standing here right now traveling, writing guidebooks, making TV shows, having fun and inspiring people to reach out and embrace the world through their travels,” he says. “That is why God put me on this planet, and I’ve got some good years ahead of me thanks to medical research.”
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