Is Thiol/Disulphide homeostasis important in prostate cancer diagnosis?

To assess the relationship between prostate cancer and thiol/disulphide homeostasisas an important indicator of oxidative stress.

After ethics committee approval (546/2015); 388 patients aged between 46-75 years who underwent transrectal ultrasound guided prostatebiopsy in three different centers between July 2015-2016 owing to serum prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels ≥2.5 ng/ml and/or abnormal digital rectal examination were involved in this study. The plasma levels of thiol/disulphide homeostasis parameters were compared in patients with and without prostate cancer.

The mean age of the patients was 62.9±7 years. In patients with prostate cancer (n=130, 33.5% ) the mean plasma levels of native thiol and total thiol were lower (332.9 vs 362.1 μmol/L and 363 vs 392.6 μmol/L, p=0.001). Plasma disulphide levels were not statistically different between the groups (15 vs 15.3 μmol/L, p=0.936). In prostate cancer group; patients with Gleason score ≥7 had lower plasma native thiol levels than patients with Gleason score<7 (321.3  vs 342.6 μmol/L, p=0.029) while there were no significant differences in total thiol and disulphide levels (352.3 vs 371.9 μmol/L, ptotal Thiol =0.064 and 15.5 vs 14.6 μmol/L, pdisulphide =0.933).

Lower plasma levels of thiol in patients with prostate cancer and high Gleason score is an oteworthy result. We believe that our results should be supported by further studies.