Radioimmunoassay (RIA) for prostatic acid phosphatase in patients with prostatic carcinoma

In recent years radioimmunological measurements of prostatic acid phosphatase have been proposed for the diagnosis, follow-up and prognosis of prostatic carcinoma. The possibility of screening male populations at risk has even been suggested. The present paper deals with the current position of this method. We studied the specificity and sensitivity of the radioimmunoassay (RIA) for prostatic acid phosphatase in three groups of patients: a normal population, patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia, and patients with untreated prostatic carcinoma. The conclusions of this study are that the RIA is a specific method but the sensitivity is much too low to use the RIA for diagnosis and screening of patients. Comparison with the enzymatic method indicates that under good laboratory conditions the latter is preferable except for patients with metastatic disease and normal enzymatic acid phosphatases.