If men behaved more like women, understanding the need for a better work-life balance and how to handle stress, many of the 32,000 new cases of prostate cancer discovered each year could be averted, according to one of Britain's leading specialists in the disease.

Prostate cancer kills one man in Britain every hour and 10,000 each year - the equivalent of a Lockerbie air disaster every week. But Professor Roger Kirby, chair of Prostate Research Campaign UK, said that many of these cases could be related to intolerable stress at work.

'We have to get men to look more to their feminine side,' said Kirby, who is also editor of the journal Prostate Cancer and Prostatic Diseases and founder of the Prostate Centre in London. 'They need to think and act more like women; share their emotions and focus on home and family, and less on pure career success.'

Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in British men. But despite facing a one in 14 chance of being diagnosed with the disease, a recent survey by the Prostate Cancer Research Foundation found that 90 per cent of men did not know anything about their prostate. 'The changes that induce cells to become cancerous are unknown, but lifestyle is critical and men are creating the lifestyles that are killing them,' said Kirby. 'Men die five years earlier than women on average, and much of that is self-inflicted.'

According to Kirby, men need to change their approach to work so that they operate more like their female colleagues. 'Women tend to work less competitively than men, don't get as aggressive, stressed or allow their anger to flare up.' he said.

'Businessmen are all too often like wildebeest on the Serengeti who don't dare to admit to any weakness, uncertainty or insecurity because they know the rest of the male herd will take any such admission to be one of weakness, and so will boot them out.'

Instead of talking through their feelings, he said, men internalised or denied their emotions. 'This means men, consciously or not, take the stress out on their wives and partners, in many cases leading to the disintegration of their home life. This is absolutely catastrophic to their health, because most men are unable to look after themselves at home and they go into a downward spiral.'

Scott Cormack, 54, head of markets for accountancy firm KPMG, was diagnosed with prostate cancer in January last year. He agreed that his lifestyle had corresponded to Kirby's description. 'I have been throwing myself into the teeth of the guns, trying to prove myself by working ever harder, since I was 19 years old,' he said. 'I regularly worked 70-hour weeks and lived in a state of permanent mental aggression.

'I watched my two marriages disintegrate. Peace and serenity were states of mind completely unknown to me. I would literally spend two days at a time, working under the most incredible stress and tension, without even stopping for a cup of tea.'

Since his successful recovery from his operation last year, Cormack has transformed his lifestyle. He now counsels other men who are considering surgery. 'The first thing they always ask is how quickly they can get back to work,' he said. 'One senior partner at KPMG has been diagnosed with prostate cancer every year for the entire decade I have worked here.'

Kirby is not surprised: 'Most men step on a treadmill in their early twenties or late teens, and can't get off it until retirement,' he said. 'But there is not much the government can do about this. We need to raise awareness among men and education them ourselves.'

But Emma Halls, chief executive of the Prostate Cancer Research Foundation, questioned that there was any evidence of lifestyle factors putting men at greater risk of developing the disease. 'The known risks are age, family history, ethnicity and diet,' she said. 'There is no link between stress and prostate cancer.

'Men know shockingly little about the disease as it is; the last thing we need is for them to think that because they lead a calm life, they are not at risk.'