Bone marrow aspiration biopsy and bone scanning in the staging of prostatic cancer

Random bone marrow aspiration biopsies of iliac crests and bone scans/skeletal X-rays were evaluated in 163 new cases of carcinoma of the prostate in order to assess the incidence of bone metastases and to compare the sensitivity of these two methods. Bone marrow biopsy revealed cancer cells in 18.4% of all cases. The detection rate of skeletal metastases of bone scan/skeletal X-ray was 32.5%. In this series all patients with positive biopsies had also positive scans. The superior sensitivity of bone scans compared with bone marrow biopsies in detecting metastatic spread of prostatic cancer is shown.