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of
medicine
presentation of case
A 63-year-old man was evaluated in the clinic because of metastatic prostate cancer
that was no longer responding to hormone therapy.
The patient had been well until eight years before he came to the clinic, when he had
noticed a decreased urinary stream and urinary hesitancy. A test for prostate-specific
antigen (PSA) six months later showed a level of 2.7 ng per milliliter; six months after
that, the PSA level was 7.7 ng per milliliter. A transrectal needle biopsy of the prostate
showed adenocarcinoma, Gleason grade 3 to 4 (on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 indicating
low-grade carcinoma, and 5 high-grade carcinoma), involving all the biopsy cores (Fig.
1A and 1B). Computed tomographic (CT) scans of the abdomen and pelvis and a bone
scan showed no abnormalities. The general physical examination also showed no abnormalities. Rectal examination revealed a firm, nodular area, 2 to 3 cm in diameter, that
involved the left lobe of the prostate and that appeared to go to the edge of the gland. The
right lobe was diffusely firm. Laboratory studies and chest radiographic studies showed
no abnormalities.
Two months later, the patient was taken to the operating room for a radical prostatectomy. On intraoperative examination of specimens obtained by bilateral pelvic lymphnode biopsy, involvement by metastatic prostate cancer was grossly evident (Fig. 1C).
The procedure was terminated, and the prostatectomy was not performed. After the
operation, the patients disease was staged as T2N2M0 (a tumor that is palpable or visible on ultrasound, involves both lobes, is associated with more than one positive regional lymph node, and is not accompanied by distant metastases). He was discharged, and
treatment with flutamide at a dose of 250 mg three times daily was prescribed. Two
months later, the patients PSA level was 1.1 ng per milliliter. External-beam radiation
treatments were administered, with a total dose of 69.4 Gy, and were completed six
months after the initial diagnosis.
At that time, the patients PSA level was 0.5 ng per milliliter, and it remained at or below that level for the next six years while he continued taking flutamide. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the lumbar spine that was performed four years after the diagnosis showed no abnormalities, and the results of all liver-function tests were normal.
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From the Division of Medical Oncology, Department of Medicine (D.S.K.), and the Departments of Urology (W.S.M.), Radiation
Oncology (A.L.Z.), Radiology (M.G.H.), and
Pathology (R.H.Y.), Massachusetts General
Hospital; and the Departments of Medicine (D.S.K.), Urology (W.S.M.), Radiation
Oncology (A.L.Z.), Radiology (M.G.H.),
and Pathology (R.H.Y.), Harvard Medical
School.
N Engl J Med 2004;351:171-8.
Copyright 2004 Massachusetts Medical Society.
july 8, 2004
171
The
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discussion of management
CC
172
Dr. W. Scott McDougal: Radical prostatectomy has several advantages: examination of the specimen offers
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Dr. William U. Shipley (Radiation Oncology): The advantages of external-beam radiation therapy as the
primary treatment for this patient with localized
prostate cancer are that it poses a very low risk of
urinary incontinence and stricture; it may eradicate
extensions of the tumor beyond the capsule of the
prostate; and when it is combined with hormonal
therapy, it may offer a chance of cure for some patients, such as this one, with intermediate-risk tumors. The disadvantages of radiation therapy are
that the treatment is long, eight to nine weeks; a
three-dimensional, conformal technique that allows the delivery of doses of at least 72 Gy may be
required; and the treatment adds a low risk of subsequent rectal symptoms. In addition, this therapeutic method does not inform the clinician about
possible metastases to lymph nodes, and the longterm sequelae of ultrahigh-dose radiation treatments are not known.
The chance of recurrence-free survival after irradiation, with the use of post-treatment PSA level as
the monitoring criterion, can be predicted by the
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The
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risk group of the patient at presentation. For patients with low-risk tumors (stage T1c, a Gleason
score of 6 or less, and a PSA level of 10 ng per milliliter or less), the rate is 70 to 80 percent.5 This patient had an intermediate-risk tumor (stage T2 tumor, Gleason score 7, and an initial PSA level of 10
to 20 ng per milliliter), and his expected chance of
survival would range from 50 to 55 percent if he
were given conventional external-beam radiation
therapy alone.
Over the past decade, the development of threedimensional conformal therapy, which uses computer software to integrate CT images of the pa-
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july 8 , 2004
Dr. Anthony L. Zietman: More than 90 percent of patients who have node-positive prostate cancer have
occult metastatic disease elsewhere. As a consequence, cure is unlikely with any localized therapy.
Many patients, however, have bulky or aggressive
disease at the primary site, which may cause local
symptoms and may be the first site of tumor progression. Two studies, one from the M.D. Anderson
Cancer Center13 and one from this institution,14
found that in patients treated with androgen deprivation alone, the primary site was the most common
first site of progression, requiring subsequent local therapy in up to 73 percent of the patients. In
contrast, of the patients treated with both androgen
deprivation and local therapy (radiation therapy or
transurethral prostatectomy), local recurrence of
disease requiring therapy developed in 11 percent
or less.
Local therapy plus androgen deprivation may
therefore be justified to extend the initial diseasefree interval and to reduce symptomatic local progression. In this patient, I recommended radiation
therapy; this was before the days of three-dimensional conformal treatment, and he received what
was then our standard dose approximately 69 Gy.
Dr. McDougal: The fact that you treated him locally does not necessarily mean that you eradicated
the local disease or eliminated the possibility of local progression.
Dr. Zietman: Absolutely not.
Dr. Kaufman: The patient did not experience any
local side effects from the radiation therapy, and he
stated that his sexual potency was unaffected. He
management of locally advanced
was free of symptoms for seven years after the diprostate cancer
agnosis; then, while he was receiving flutamide,
Dr. Kaufman: Dr. Gomery, you were the surgeon car- the PSA level rose to 0.9 ng per milliliter and then
ing for this patient. Please tell us what you did and to 1.4 ng per milliliter. The flutamide was disconthe reasons for your decisions.
tinued. Intramuscular leuprolide was begun six
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175
The
Dr. Matthew R. Smith (Hematology/Oncology): Androgen-deprivation therapy by either bilateral orchiectomy or administration of a gonadotropinreleasing hormone agonist such as leuprolide is
the mainstay of treatment for advanced or metastatic prostate cancer. Androgen-deprivation therapy by
either method decreases serum testosterone levels
by more than 95 percent and leads to objective responses in the majority of patients. Monotherapy
with antiandrogens is an alternative to standard androgen-deprivation therapy. Flutamide is a nonsteroidal antiandrogen that blocks the action of testosterone by binding to the androgen receptor in target
tissue. This mans disease responded to flutamide
monotherapy for more than six years. About two
thirds of men with progressive disease who receive
antiandrogen monotherapy will respond to subsequent androgen-deprivation therapy. The long duration of the response to flutamide monotherapy in
this case suggests a higher-than-average chance of
a response to subsequent medical or surgical castration. In addition, in a few men treated with a
gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonist, testosterone levels approaching those achieved by bilateral orchiectomy are not reached. I recommend the
measurement of serum-testosterone levels for patients who either do not have a response or who have
unexpectedly short responses to a gonadotropinreleasing hormone agonist. Bilateral orchiectomy
may prove effective in the men whose testosterone
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anatomical diagnosis
Adenocarcinoma of the prostate with metastases.
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177
refer enc es
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Copyright 2004 Massachusetts Medical Society.
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