Permanent seed brachytherapy for locally recurrent prostate cancer after radical prostatectomy: a case report and review of the literature

Abstract

Purpose: To describe the management of a patient with locally recurrent prostate cancer in the prostate bed, 10 years after a radical prostatectomy.

Methods and materials: A 71-year-old man had a radical prostatectomy for a Gleason 7 clinical T2a carcinoma of the prostate in 2000. Final pathologic stage was pT3a pN0. Postoperatively his prostate-specific antigen was undetectable, but by 2008 it was 1.0ng/mL and in 2011 it reached to 1.43ng/mL. He was referred for consideration of salvage radiotherapy. Staging workup was negative but transrectal ultrasound revealed a 15cc recurrence in the prostate bed. A combination of external beam radiation therapy (4600/23/4.5 weeks to the pelvis) and a brachytherapy boost (115Gy) was selected for definitive management. Androgen ablation was not used.

Results: The treatment was well tolerated. The brachytherapy boost was planned in a similar fashion to a de novo implant for an intact prostate. The postimplant dosimetry was evaluated using magnetic resonance imaging-computed tomography (MR-CT) fusion and appeared satisfactory. Acute toxicity was minimal. Six months after brachytherapy, the prostate-specific antigen had fallen from 1.43 to 0.05ng/mL.

Conclusions: Dose escalation with combined external beam and brachytherapy may be feasible if recurrent disease can be visualized using transrectal ultrasound and encompassed in an implanted volume. Although longer followup and a larger series of patients are required to demonstrate safety and efficacy, consideration should be given this approach.