title: Incidental carcinoma of the prostate: selection for deferred treatment.
abstract: Fifty-one of 212 consecutive patients with prostatic cancer presented with incidentally diagnosed (TO) cancer. The average age at presentation was 73 years and follow-up ranged from 1 to 62 months. Deferred treatment was selected in 39 cases, 10 of which progressed. Of 15 deaths only 3 were related to prostate cancer and these were patients who had presented with metastases. Histological grading by the Gleason system demonstrated a significant correlation with metastatic stage at presentation and tumour bulk, but not with age or progression in deferred treatment cases. It is concluded that there is a need to subdivide patients presenting with incidental carcinoma, that tumour bulk correlates with histological grade and that future treatment protocols for TO disease should stratify for histological grade.
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology* / Q000628:therapy