Purpose: Optimal management of pathologic T3 prostate cancer is poorly defined. We conducted a prospective study of untreated pT3 patients to improve understanding of the natural history of this disease and to identify clinical parameters useful in patient selection for adjuvant therapy.
Materials and methods: Of 583 consecutive patients with clinical stage T1 to 2 disease managed by total prostatectomy, 206 had pT3 disease. Excluding patients requesting immediate adjuvant treatment or neoadjuvant therapy, 156 subjects were eligible for the study, including 34 with pT3a, 80 pT3b, 22 pT3c, and 20 pT3N+ disease. Patients were followed for prostate-specific antigen (PSA) recurrence of greater than 0.2 ng./ml. and biopsy proved local or distant tumor progression demonstrated by imaging studies.
Results: After a median of 45 months, PSA recurrence was seen in 29.4% of pT3a (10/34), 30% of pT3b (24/80), 27.3% of pT3c (6/22), and 80% of pT3N+ (16/20 cases). Local or distant progression was seen in 2.9% of pT3a (1), 6.2% of pT3b (5), 9.1% of pT3c (2), and 55% of pT3N+ (11 cases). Recurrence and progression correlated with the number of surgical margins involved by tumor, pathological Gleason score and baseline pre-prostatectomy PSA levels. PSA recurrence was seen in 20.8% (10/48) patients with 1 surgical margin involved, 40.9% (9/22) with 2 margins involved and 50% (5/10) with 3 or more margins involved. PSA recurrence was 20.3% (14/69) with Gleason scores of less than 7, 33.9% (19/56) with a score of 7 and 74.2% (23/31) with scores of greater than 7. Pre-prostatectomy PSA levels less than 10 ng./ml. were associated with a PSA recurrence of 17.3% (14/81) and 45.4% (25/55), with levels greater than 10 ng./ml. Selecting patients for high or low risk based upon the results of these parameters allowed accurate prediction of PSA recurrence; 8.5% (4/47) for low risk patients and 44.8% (30/67) for high risk. Tumor progression was seen in no low risk patient and in 9% (6) with high risk. The difference between the 2 risk groups was highly significant (p <0.0001).
Conclusions: The majority of patients with pT3 prostate cancer will not experience recurrent disease for many years if ever. Immediate use of adjuvant treatment should be reserved for those patients with a high risk of recurrent disease.