Early diagnostics of prostate cancer based on a comprehensive analysis of risk factors

BACKGROUND: There is a trend of increasing incidence and mortality from prostate cancer. Existing methods for early diagnosis and screening of prostate cancer did not demonstrate enough efficiency.

AIM: To improve the quality and efficiency of diagnostic measures for prostate cancer through a personalized approach to patients based on an analysis of a set of risk factors.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: The methodology was developed using the data from the population-based Cancer Registry of the Altai Territory, created at the Altai Regional Oncology Center in Barnaul, Russia. At the moment the Cancer Registry included information on 308 550 patients with malignant neoplasms, including 15 167 males with prostate cancer. On the basis of the method of prostate cancer risk assessment proposed by Lazarev AF an automated program for early diagnosis of prostate cancer has been developed. Testing of this technique included assessment of 532 patients (aged between 23 and 82).

RESULTS: 128 patients were determined to belong to the high risk pre-cancer group. A high-risk precancer registry was created, which included the patients having individual risk of developing prostate cancer either increased or high or absolute. Upon a set of in-depth examinations, 7 of 128 patients (9.3%) were diagnosed with prostate cancer, all at early stages (I or II). Thus, the incidence of prostate cancer among the patients from the high risk pre-cancer registry was significantly higher than the average observed during prophylactic examinations (0.01%).

CONCLUSION: The automated program for early diagnosis of prostate cancer could be implemented with the aim to assign in-depth examination in more targeted manner to patients at high risk of prostate cancer and to contribute to detection the cancer in the early stages.