Predictive medicine in non-malignant urological disorders.
The potential of disease prediction in non-malignant disorders should not be undervalued. Such disorders present several characteristics which make them suitable for disease prediction: they can be wide-spread, strongly affect the patients' quality of life, lead to a heavy burden on social health expenses and have a protracted clinical course. Moreover, people who present a high risk for non-malignant disease can be successfully introduced to long-term preventive measures such as lifestyle modifications, dietary changes and improvement in hygienic conditions. There is a growing demand for developing predictive medical strategies in urology. While urological cancers are the main focus of interest, we analyse the potentialities and challenges of predictive medicine in non-malignant urological disorders, with particular attention to benign prostate hyperplasia and urolithiasis.
Mancini
Mariangela
M
Department of Urology, University of Padova Medical School, Via Giustiniani 2, 35128 Padova, Italy. mariangela.mancini@unipd.it
Cisternino
Antonio
A
Tavolini
Ivan Matteo
IM
Dal Moro
Fabrizio
F
Bassi
Pierfrancesco
P
D018450:Disease Progression; D005260:Female; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011315:Preventive Medicine / Q000379:methods; D011470:Prostatic Hyperplasia / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000503:physiopathology; D012008:Recurrence; D018570:Risk Assessment; D014545:Urinary Calculi / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000503:physiopathology