Actress and influencer Anita Permata Sari is bringing attention to the topic now that her own 75-year-old father is battling stage-4 prostate cancer.
Speaking with FMT Lifestyle, Anita said alarm bells started ringing in May, when she noticed her father growing unusually weak, losing his appetite, and dropping to just 43kg.
“My father was a typical Asian dad, who hated to go to the hospital,” she shared.
Mahendran Nayagam, better known as Mike, said: “One day, I suddenly felt a pain between my legs.” Like many, he initially attributed it to hurting himself while cleaning the house the day before.
“I didn’t pay much attention at first, but later I realised the pain wasn’t going away, and eventually, I couldn’t even walk.”
That’s when Mike finally consulted a doctor alongside Anita, who had just, that same day, detected two lumps in her father’s pelvic region.
“The next day when we had the appointment with the doctor, I don’t know what came over me, call it a sixth sense, to just check his body including his private area. It’s not a normal thing for a daughter to do, but that’s when I found the two lumps on the pelvic region.”
At first, the doctor thought it might be a torn ligament. However, since there was no definitive confirmation, they sought second, third and fourth opinions.
After considering other possibilities like lymphoma or tuberculosis, a biopsy revealed Mike had prostate cancer.
With no family history of prostate cancer, the diagnosis came as a shock – to both father and daughter.
“It’s something no child is ready to hear – that your father has stage-4 prostate cancer. It broke me, it felt like my world collapsed,” Anita said.
With the disease already spreading to Mike’s bones, doctors believe it may have been developing for around eight years.
“If I had postponed my father’s hospital visit in May, the cancer could have spread to his kidneys,” she said, warning how much more fatal it could have become.
“But all of this could have been avoided with just one blood test in the past eight years,” Anita added.
Early-stage prostate cancer often shows no symptoms, making it a “silent disease” usually detected only through screening.
Despite these difficult times, Anita has been open on social media, sharing her father’s battle with prostate cancer. One of her videos has racked up over one million views.
“If my videos can help people out there who are feeling a bit lost, I’ll be the happiest. Some of them have lost their husbands or fathers, and when I shared my videos on social media, people told me, ‘I wish I had watched this earlier.’”
Anita added: “A lot of men appreciate it because a woman talking about prostate cancer is something unique.”
Initially living in Johor, Mike moved to Kuala Lumpur to stay with Anita. Due to his age, chemotherapy was not recommended. He began hormonal therapy instead.
Anita supported him by researching nutrition, introducing dietary changes like soursop leaves, tomatoes, removing refined carbs and sugar, and incorporating regular exercise.
Slowly, Mike’s appetite returned, and he has even regained enough strength to jog several laps around the KLCC Park.
“After taking the hormonal jabs, his PSA (prostate-specific antigen) went from 818 to 3.65 in just three months. It’s almost like a miracle. The normal number is 6.5, but his was below that. Even the doctor was surprised,” Anita said with a smile.
While the cancer remains, it is now manageable.
Anita admitted that, despite not being very close to her father while growing up, this life-or-death experience has strengthened their bond.
Mike said: “Without her I wouldn’t be sitting here.”
And his message to Malaysians? Don’t put it off, get your medical check-up every year before it’s too late.