IN the summer of 2012 – just before the Olympics – I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. I was 55.

Over the last five years I have undergone numerous treatments and the implications of these have changed my life forever.

In Wales there are more than 17,000 men like me – living with or after a prostate cancer diagnosis and every year more than 550 will sadly die from the disease. This needs to change.

Over the next few weeks men who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer will start receiving a crucial survey from their hospital.

Its aim is to build up a detailed picture of the impact of prostate cancer on all aspects of a man’s everyday life, by asking the only people who really know – men who’ve been there.

I urge any of your readers who receive this survey to please fill it in and add their voice to tens of thousands of others fighting for change. This isn’t just another lifestyle survey.

The more men who respond, the more forceful the findings will be.

Mark Leonard

Prostate Cancer Survivor

On behalf of Prostate Cancer UK and the Movember Foundation