Purpose: Staging for prostate cancer often includes computed tomography (CT) and bone scan in Japan. We examined the criteria of avoiding unnecessary CT and bone scan for the prostate cancer patients at Matsusaka Chuo General Hospital.
Subjects and methods: 211 patients were newly diagnosed at our institution between 1998 September and 2004 April. We reviewed data from 208 patients who had a staging CT and bone scan. The data was analysed using Gleason score, clinical T-stage and serum prostatic specific antigen (PSA) level.
Results: CT detected lymphadenopathy in 19 patients (9.1%), Bone scan detected bone metastasis in 31 patients (14.9%). However there was no lymphadenopathy detected by CT in the patients with 20 ng/ml or less. In the analysis using PSA and Gleason score, there was no bone metastasis detected by bone scan in the patients with PSA level of 20 ng/ml or less and Gleason sum 7 or less. In the analysis using PSA and clinical local stage there was no bone metastasis detected by bone scan in the patients with PSA level of 20 ng/ml or less and localized lesion (cT1-2).
Conclusion: In a new proatate cancer patient CT and bone scan can be avoidable by PSA level of 20 ng/ml or less and cT1-2 or less and Gleason sum 7 or less.