Prostate cancer prognosis in men with other malignancies prior to radical prostatectomy

Cancer survivors are often diagnosed with subsequent prostate cancer. To improve medical care of these patients, we examined the oncological outcomes in men with prostate cancer and a cancer history.

We retrospectively analyzed data from 25,422 prostate cancer patients, who underwent a radical prostatectomy between 1992 and 2016. Patients with other malignancies were identified using medical records and self-administrated questionnaires. Cox regression and Kaplan Meier analysis of a propensity score-matched patient cohort were performed to examine biochemical recurrence-free survival, metastasis-free survival, overall survival and prostate cancer-specific survival. Competing risk analysis was used to estimate other-cause mortality, other cancer-specific mortality, and prostate cancer-specific mortality. Statistical analysis was performed using R.

Of all patients, 6.4% were diagnosed with other malignancy prior to radical prostatectomy. Patients with tumor history were older (median: 66 years vs. 64 years., P< 0,001) and showed a higher tumor volume (median: 4.0 ml vs. 3.6 ml, P = 0.02) than patients without. The risk of biochemical recurrence and metastasis development after radical prostatectomy was similar. All-cause mortality was significantly increased (hazard ratio 2.0; 95% confidence interval 1.7-2.4), while prostate cancer-specific mortality was lower (hazard ratio 0.4; 95% confidence interval 0.23-0.87) in patients with additional malignancy. In a propensity score-matched cohort overall survival was significantly adverse (P< 0.001) and prostate cancer-specific survival was higher (P= 0.003) in patients with other malignancy prior to surgery.

A higher other-cause mortality in men with tumor history should be concerned in the decision-making for medical care of prostate cancer patients in favor of reserved care strategies.