1986 Volume 77 Issue 5 Pages 711-715
One hundred and twenty-two consecutive cases with prostate cancer diagnosed at The University of Tokyo between 1973 and 1983 were folowed up. The number of patients increased rapidly in the sixties and reached its highest in the seventies. Almost two thirds of the patients were staged as C and D. Hormone therapy was carried out in 71.3 per cent of patients as an initial treatment.
Provided that deaths of other causes are treated in the same manner as those lost to follow up, the 5-year survival rate of stages A, B, C and D calculated with Kaplan-Meier method were 100%, 64.7%, 54.4% and 31.3%, respectively.
Forty-nine of 87 patients (56.3per cent) treated with hormones relapsed or did not respond at al.
These patients had a poorer prognosis than those who responded well and did not relapse in the subsequent course of the treatment.
This finding suggests that one half of patients with prostate cancer may get little or no benefit from hormone therapy.
In this context, a new diagnostic technique for quantitative prediction of hormone dependency, as well as a new treatment for hormone refractory prostate cancer, is awaited for improving the prognosis of patients with this cancer.
