title: Prognostic value of the percentage of positive fragments in biopsies from patients with localized prostate cancer.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To assess the prognostic value of the percentage of positive fragments (PPF) in biopsies from patients with localized prostate cancer (PCa) undergoing radical prostatectomy.
  
  
  METHODS
  During the period from March 1991 to November 2000, 440 patients were selected. Cases receiving neoadjuvant or adjuvant hormone therapy, or adjuvant radiotherapy, were excluded, as were cases presenting Gleason scores higher than 6 at biopsy. PPF was defined as the total number of fragments divided by the total number of biopsy fragments times 100. This variable was initially divided into categories from 0 to 25%, 25.1% to 50%, 50.1 to 75% and 75% to 100%. During the postoperative period, patients were assessed every 2 months for 1 year, then every 6 months for 5 years, and then yearly. Biochemical recurrence was defined as serum PSA higher than or equal to 0.4 ng/mL. Median follow-up was 60 months.
  
  
  RESULTS
  One hundred and nine (24.8%) of the 440 patients under study had biochemical recurrence. In the univariate analysis, PPF significantly influenced disease-free survival (log-rank, p < 0.001), and patients with PPF between 75 and 100% presented a risk of a biochemical recurrence of the disease 3 times higher than patients with PPF between 0 and 25% (p < 0.001). After the Cox regression analysis, both serum PSA (p = 0.001) and PPF (p < 0.001) showed to be independent predictive factors for disease-free survival following surgery.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  PPF measurement in biopsy is a simple and practical method, which should be routinely used as a predictive factor for biochemical recurrence in patients with PCa presenting Gleason scores between 2 and 6.
authors.affiliation: Division of Urology, Paulista School of Medicine, Federal University of Sao Paulo, UNIFESP, Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil.
authors.forename: Alberto A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Antunes
authors.forename: Marcos F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Dall'Oglio
authors.forename: Alexandre C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Sant'Anna
authors.forename: Mario
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Paranhos
authors.forename: Katia R M
authors.initials: KR
authors.lastname: Leite
authors.forename: Miguel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Srougi
mesh_terms: D001706:Biopsy / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009364:Neoplasm Recurrence, Local; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011182:Postoperative Care; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D011468:Prostatectomy / Q000379:methods*; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D012307:Risk Factors; D016019:Survival Analysis