Age and aggressiveness of prostate cancer: analysis of clinical and pathological characteristics after radical prostatectomy for men with localized prostate cancer

INTRODUCTION: The aim of this study was to describe age- related prostate cancer (PCa) characteristics in men after radical prostatectomy (RP). MATERIAL AND METHODS: There were 2,373 men who underwent RP for clinically localized PCa between 2002 and 2017 and had complete data that were included into the study. Among them, 315 (13.3%) men aged ≤55 years (GR-1), 1,098 (46.3%) men aged between 56 to 65 years (GR-2) and 960 (40.4%) men aged older than 65 years (GR-3) were identified. All preoperative and pathological parameters were compared between all three groups and between each group separately. High-risk prostate cancer (HRPCa) cases were analyzed separately. Regression analysis was used to evaluate the impact of age on cancer aggressiveness. RESULT: Clinical stage (cT), biopsy Gleason score and D'Amico risk groups were different comparing age-related study groups (all p <0.01), respectively. Preoperatively cT1 and Gleason 6 were in the highest rate for GR-1 in comparison with GR-3: 35.9 vs. 27.1%, p = 0.003 and 65.1% vs. 56.7%, p = 0.008, respectively. Analyzing pathological parameters, only Gleason 9–10 was different between GR-1 and GR-3–3.8 vs. 7.6%, p = 0.02. There were 921 (38.8%) HRPCa cases identified. Age was a significant predictor for HRPCa (p = 0.019) in the regression analysis. The oldest men (GR-3) had up to 1.5 fold increased risk for HRPCa detection in comparison with the youngest one (p = 0.008, HR1.44. 95% CI 1.098–1.87). CONCLUSIONS: Younger, ≤55-year-old men, are more likely to present with less aggressive clinical and pathological PCa features in comparison with the older ones. Increasing age has a significant influence on HRPCa detection after RP.