[Imaging of the prostate]

Recently several new technologies for prostate imaging have been developed. The aim of these technologies was to improve the diagnosis of prostate cancer. Especially the transrectal ultrasound (TRUS) has been refined to the so-called enhanced ultrasound, as regular grey scale TRUS has limited ability to identify cancer lesions in the prostate. In several studies elastography has shown good capability to identify cancer lesions in the prostate as well as to absolutely increase the detection rate of randomized biopsies by up to 10 %.. Contrast-enhanced ultrasound shows varying results in the published literature with increased detection rates on the one hand and unchanged detection rates relative to randomized biopsy on the other hand. The online available ANNA/C-TRUS system shows detection rates with six targeted biopsies that are comparable to the published detection rates of randomized saturation biopsies. Direct systematic comparison to randomized biopsies is missing. The Histoscanning system currently provides the poorest data as no biopsy studies are available. Multicenter trials are mandatory for all new imaging technologies in order to implement them as standard into clinical practice.