Prostate HistoScanning: a screening tool for prostate cancer?

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate Prostate HistoScanning as a screening tool for prostate cancer in a pilot study.

Methods: During a 6-month period, 94 men with normal or suspicious digital rectal examination, normal or elevated prostate-specific antigen, or an increased prostate-specific antigen velocity were examined with Prostate HistoScanning. Based on these parameters and HistoScanning analysis, 41 men were referred for prostate biopsy under computer-aided ultrasonographic guidance. The number of random biopsy cores varied depending on the prostate volume. Targeted biopsies were taken in the case of computer-aided ultrasonographic area suspicious for malignancy. A logistic regression analysis was carried out to estimate the probability of resulting in a positive prostate biopsy based on the HistoScanning findings.

Results: Following a logistic regression analysis, after adjusting for age, digital rectal examination, serum prostate-specific antigen level, prostate volume and tumor lesion volume, every cancer volume increase of 1 mL estimated by HistoScanning was associated with a nearly threefold increase in the probability of resulting in a positive biopsy (odds ratio 2.9; 95% confidence interval 1.2-7.0; P-value 0.02). Prostate cancer was found in 17 of 41 men (41%). In patients with cancer, computer-aided ultrasonography-guided biopsy was 4.5-fold more likely to detect cancer than random biopsy. The prostate cancer detection rate for random biopsy and directed biopsy was 13% and 58%, respectively. HistoScanning-guided biopsy significantly decreased the number of biopsies necessary (P-value <0.0001).

Conclusions: Our findings suggest that Prostate HistoScanning might be helpful for the selection of patients in whom prostate biopsies are necessary. This imaging technique can be used to direct biopsies in specific regions of the prostate with a higher cancer detection rate.

Keywords: HistoScanning; biopsy; prostate cancer.