Prostate-specific antigen

Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) has revolutionized the diagnosis and manage ment of men with prostate cancer. Significant advances have been made since the early development of immunoassays. While PSA is useful for staging and monitoring of established disease, it has shown the greatest utility in th e realm of early detection realm. PSA is the most important tumor marker; i ts importance in evaluating men for the possibility of prostate cancer is i rrefutable. Enhancing specificity isa pressing need. In this regard, the re cognition of the molecular forms of free PSA and complex PSA have shown the most promise and undoubtedly will result in fewer false-positive PSA test results. The salient literature is reviewed and commentary made on the curr ent status of PSA with particular emphasis on methods to enhance its specif icity in early detection and applications. (C) 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc.