Use of the UPOINT chronic prostatitis/chronic pelvic pain syndrome classification in European patient cohorts: sexual function domain improves correlations

Abstract

Purpose: Patients with chronic prostatitis-chronic pelvic pain syndrome are difficult to treat due to the unknown etiology and complex clinical presentation. Clinical phenotyping may better correlate with multimodal treatment concepts than a current diagnosis. We evaluated a novel clinical phenotyping system in a database of patients with chronic prostatitis-chronic pelvic pain syndrome at 2 European institutions and correlated it with patient symptoms. We also investigated the addition of a sexual dysfunction domain in regard to symptom correlation and system internal consistency.

Materials and methods: We retrospectively classified 937 patients from Milan, Italy, and 290 from Giessen, Germany, with chronic prostatitis-chronic pelvic pain syndrome into a 6-domain phenotyping system, consisting of urinary, psychosocial, organ specific, infection, neurological and muscle tenderness domains, termed UPOINT. Symptom severity was assessed by the National Institutes of Health Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index and the International Prostate Symptom Score.

Results: There was significant correlation between the number of positive UPOINT domains and Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index/International Prostate Symptom Score symptoms in the total and Italian cohorts but not in the German cohort. After adding a sexual dysfunction domain to create the modified UPOINTS system phenotypic domains also correlated significantly with Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index symptoms in the German cohort.

Conclusions: Consistency of the UPOINT chronic prostatitis-chronic pelvic pain syndrome clinical phenotyping system was generally confirmed by our study and further refined by adding a sexual dysfunction domain. The treatment effect of clinical phenotyping with UPOINT(S) must be extensively evaluated in prospective treatment studies.