Neuroendocrine Carcinoma as an Independent Prognostic Factor for Patients With Prostate Cancer: A Population-Based Study

BACKGROUND: Neuroendocrine carcinoma (NEC) is a rare and highly malignant variation of prostate adenocarcinoma. We aimed to investigate the prognostic value of NEC in prostate cancer. METHODS: A total of 530440 patients of prostate cancer, including neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC) and adenocarcinoma from 2004 to 2018 were obtained from the national Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database. Propensity score matching (PSM), multivariable Cox proportional hazard model, Kaplan‐Meier method and subgroup analysis were performed in our study. RESULTS: NEPC patients were inclined to be older at diagnosis (Median age, 69(61-77) vs. 65(59-72), P< 0.001) and had higher rates of muscle invasive disease (30.9% vs. 9.2%, P < 0.001), lymph node metastasis (32.2% vs. 2.2%, P < 0.001), and distal metastasis (45.7% vs. 3.6%, P < 0.001) compared with prostate adenocarcinoma patients. However, the proportion of NEPC patients with PSA levels higher than 4.0 ng/mL was significantly less than adenocarcinoma patients (47.3% vs. 72.9%, P<0.001). NEPC patients had a lower rate of receiving surgery treatment (28.8% vs. 43.9%, P<0.001), but they had an obviously higher rate of receiving chemotherapy (57.9% vs. 1.0%, P<0.001). A Cox regression analysis demonstrated that the NEPC patients faced a remarkably worse OS (HR = 2.78, 95% CI = 2.34–3.31, P < 0.001) and CSS (HR = 3.07, 95% CI = 2.55–3.71, P < 0.001) compared with adenocarcinoma patients after PSM. Subgroup analyses further suggested that NEPC patients obtained significantly poorer prognosis across nearly all subgroups. CONCLUSION: The prognosis of NEPC was worse than that of adenocarcinoma among patients with prostate cancer. The histological subtype of NEC is an independent prognostic factor for patients with prostate cancer.