Like the standard PSA test, the latest version was developed by Hybritech Inc., a San Diego-based subsidiary of Beckman Coulter in Fullerton, California. Hybritech Inc. funded the free PSA test research. Washington University School of Medicine runs the largest prostate cancer screening study at a single institution in the nation. More than 32,000 men have been enrolled. The other centers that participated in the clinical trial of free PSA are Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Harvard University in Boston, Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Loyola University in Chicago, University of California - Los Angeles, and the University of Washington in Seattle.
Prostate cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in American men and the second deadliest.
In 1998, an estimated 184,500 American men will learn they have prostate cancer and more than 39,200 American men likely will die from the disease.