Clinicopathologic features and outcomes of anterior-dominant prostate cancer: implications for diagnosis and treatment

Abstract

This study aims to describe the pathological features and clinical outcomes in anterior-dominant prostate cancer (APCA) compared to posterior/posterolateral-dominant prostate cancer (PPCA) among men treated with radical prostatectomy for localized prostate cancer. This is a single-institution, matched case-control analysis of short-term clinical outcomes stratified by pathologic tumor location at radical prostatectomy. Pathologic data extracted by expert genitourinary pathologists on tumor location was linked to clinical and oncologic outcomes data from a prospective institutional database for analysis. From 2005 to 2013, 1580 patients were identified for analysis with 150 (9.5%) having APCA. One-hundred and thirty two of these APCA men had complete clinical data and were matched to 353 men with PPCA (~1:3 ratio) by GrdGrp at surgery, margin status, and pathologic T stage. There were no racial/ethnic differences between APCA and PPCA (p = 0.13). Men with APCA demonstrated a higher median PSA at diagnosis (6.4 [4.6-9.1] ng/mL vs 5.6 [4.4-8.1] ng/mL; p = 0.04), a higher rate of GrdGrp 1 disease at diagnosis (57.7% vs. 40.0%, p = 0.003), and lower rates of abnormal digital rectal examination (DRE) (10.1% vs. 23.2%, p = 0.003) when compared to PPCA. The rate of surgical upgrading was higher among men with APCA vs. PPCA (55.3% vs 42.0%, p = 0.015). Freedom from biochemical failure (BF) at 5-years was 85.1% (95% CI 73.1-98.9) for APCA and 82.9% (95% CI 69.2-99.5) for men with PPCA (p = 0.70, log-rank test). The majority of anterior tumors were undetectable by DRE and were associated with higher PSA at diagnosis. Despite presenting mostly as low/intermediate grade cancers, more than half of the men with APCA had upgrading at surgery and slightly more than 40% had positive margins and/or extraprostatic disease. When matched to a cohort of posterior predominant tumors, no differences were seen in the rate of biochemical-failure after prostatectomy.