Expand and collapse the following frequently asked questions below by clicking on them:

• Will this study help me?
  • As a SELECT participant, you will be our partner in medical research and may decrease your chance of getting prostate cancer. Participation in the study will also provide you an opportunity to help future generations, such as your sons and grandsons, avoid prostate cancer. If you like to take multivitamins, we will give you and your spouse a special Multivitamin that has no selenium or vitamin E. The Multivitamin is free of charge.
•  
• Are there other studies looking at the effects of selenium and/or vitamin E?
  • Vitamin E has now been tested in several clinical trials with patients at high risk of developing heart disease related to hardening of the arteries or Coronary Heart Disease (CHD). The summary of four independent clinical trials shows no proof that CHD can be prevented by taking vitamin E by itself. One other large trial with vitamin E and beta-carotene also shows no benefit. Several cardiovascular trials are still in progress using a combination of vitamin E with other vitamin like substances. The American Heart Association does not currently recommend vitamin E, at any dose, as a preventive medicine for CHD. There are several National Cancer Institute sponsored trials currently evaluating vitamin E and/or selenium along with other drugs looking at prostate, polyps and lung cancer. If you go back to the home page and click on Ancillary Studies, you will see other research going on in SELECT for other health issues. If you click on Related Links, you can link to the National Institutes of Health to see many more studies.
•  
• How is SELECT different from other clinical trials?
  • SELECT is the first study to focus on whether or not selenium and/or vitamin E can help prevent prostate cancer. SELECT is different than most trials because it is a prevention study and not a treatment study. SELECT seeks to prevent prostate cancer instead of treating prostate cancer that already exists.
•  
• How does my doctor get information about the study?
  • Your doctor can call your Study Site to get information about the study. You can discuss the study with your doctor and share the materials we give you.
•  
• What is in the placebo?
  • Two types of placebos are used in this study. Both contain only inactive ingredients. The placebo that looks and tastes the same as the selenium capsule contains dicalcium phosphate only. The placebo that looks and tastes the same as the vitamin E capsule contains soybean oil. The capsules used for the placebos are Gelatin capsules. [rev. 4/02]
•  
• Why is it necessary to use a placebo?
  • The placebo group of the trial is very important because it will let us know of the benefits of dietary intake of selenium and vitamin E. At the end of SELECT, all information obtained will be reviewed to see if those participants taking the vitamin E and/or selenium received any real effect when compared to those participants who took one or both supplements as a placebo. Without a placebo, we could not tell whether the vitamin E alone, selenium alone or both together were effective. In other studies, where the participants were on the placebo, they were found to be at less risk than the participants on the active drug or intervention. This would not have been known without the placebo group.
    
    By participating in SELECT, no matter what group you are in, you are important to the study. You will receive facts about preventing and treating prostate cancer, reminders to get your exams, and the opportunity to help answer an important question about whether or not vitamin E and/or selenium at the dosage and concentration levels we provide can prevent prostate cancer.
•  
• Not including age, is there one group of men more at risk than another for prostate cancer?
  • A man's risk of prostate cancer is higher if his father or brother has had the disease. African-American men are at a higher risk for prostate cancer than men of other ethnic backgrounds. The reason for this is unclear. In general, men in the United States and Canada have a higher risk of prostate cancer compared to men in most other countries.