Inability of bone turnover marker as a strong prognostic indicator in prostate cancer patients with bone metastasis: Comparison with the extent of disease (EOD) grade

BACKGROUND. Although clinical investigations of bone turnover markers in pr ostate cancer patients have been conducted, the relationships of pretreatme nt levels of the markers to the prognosis of patients with bone metastasis has not been fully examined. METHODS. The serum levels of carboxy-terminal propeptide of type I procolla gen (PICP) and carboxy-terminal telopeptide of type I collagen (ICTP), alka line phosphatase (ALP), and prostate-specific antigen (PSA) were examined i n 48 untreated prostate cancer patients with bone metastasis, and the progn oses of the patients were evaluated using univariate and multivariate analy ses. RESULTS. The patients,vith low PICP or ALP values had significantly better outcomes in terms of cause-specific survival compared to the patients with high PICP or ALP values. There was no significant difference in survival be tween patients with high and low ICTP or PSA values. The multivariate analy sis of PICP, ICTP, ALP, PSA, and extent of disease (EOD) grade revealed tha t only the EOD grade was an important prognostic indicator for survival. CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrate that the extent of bone metastasis e valuated by bone scintigrams is a more important prognostic indicator than are the serum biochemical markers of bone tumor er. (C) 1999 Wiley-Liss, In c.