Iowa’s long-time attorney general is back in the office full-time after recovering from surgery to treat prostate cancer.
Tom Miller says his life is returning to normal following the March 11th procedure.
"I’ve been doing well," Miller said. "I really appreciate the medical care I received. I had a good surgery and the follow up tests were all good."
The 64-year-old Miller is in his seventh term as Iowa’s attorney general.
On Wednesday, he presided over his first news conference since the surgery and discussed details of a consumer fraud lawsuit filed by his office against a professional fundraising company. Miller was working from home shortly after the surgery, then started spending afternoons in the office before returning full-time in recent weeks.
Miller says a routine "PSA" blood test detected the prostate cancer in its early stages. "(Men) should really watch their PSA count," Miller said. "Men and women should get colonoscopies. I had one of those in January as well and that one turned out fine, but both of them are really important for people to do on a regular basis because prevention work is incredibly important in the cancer arena."
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed in American men, other than skin cancers. It’s generally recommended that men have PSA blood tests and digital exams every year beginning at age 50. "Mine was elevated for a few years, but was okay," Miller said. "Then, it made another jump up and wasn’t okay. We’d been watching it for a few years and that’s incredibly important for prostate cancer. If you catch it early, it makes all the difference in the world."
Miller was first elected attorney general in 1978. After an unsuccessful run at the governor’s office in 1990, Miller was re-elected as attorney general in 1998, 2002 and 2006.