The role of National Institutes of Health category IV prostatitis in accurately staging the newly diagnosed prostate cancer.
BACKGROUND
It has been known that the National Institutes of Health category IV (NIH-IV) prostatitis increases the serum total prostate-specific antigen (tPSA) in patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia. However, the effect of NIH-IV prostatitis on tPSA levels, which are used for staging prostate cancer (PCa) in patients with PCa, has not been previously investigated.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the effect of NIH-IV prostatitis on the tPSA which is used for staging PCa in patients with newly diagnosed PCa.


METHODS
A total of 198 patients in whom PCa was detected were included in the study. Group 1 included patients with only PCa, while Group 2 included patients with prostatitis and PCa. The tPSA levels of patients in Groups 1 and 2 were compared.


RESULTS
A total of 120 (61%) PCa (Group 1) and 78 (39%) PCa+NIH-IV prostatitis (Group 2) patients were identified. The tPSA levels of 70 (58%) patients in Group 1 and 22 (28%) patients in Group 2 were at the interval of <20 ng/ml (the mean levels of tPSA: 11.8±4.5 and 14.1±3.3, respectively). The tPSA levels of 50 (42%) patients in Group 1 and 56 (72%) patients in Group 2 were within the range of ≥20 ng/ml (the mean levels of tPSA: 39.9±31.0 and 47.0±29.2, respectively). Within both the <20 ng/ml range and ≥20 ng/ml range, the mean tPSA value in Group 2 was found to be significantly higher than that of Group 1 (p=0.03 and 0.01, respectively).


CONCLUSIONS
The existence of NIH-IV prostatitis together with cancer in patients with PCa significantly increases the tPSA level which is used in staging the PCa.
Clinics of Urology, Elazig Education and Research Hospital, Elazig, 23100, Turkey. uroloji23@yahoo.com
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Aglamis
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Tasdemir
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Ceylan
D000368:Aged; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging / Q000379:methods*; D017430:Prostate-Specific Antigen / Q000097:blood; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000097:blood / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology; D011472:Prostatitis / Q000097:blood / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D014481:United States
D017430:Prostate-Specific Antigen