Gleason grade grouping of prostate cancer is of prognostic value in Asian men

The International Society of Urological Pathology made recommendations for the use of Grade Groups (GG) originally described by Epstein and colleagues over Gleason score (GS) alone in 2014, which was subsequently adopted by the WHO classification in 2016. The majority of studies validating this revision have been in Caucasian populations. We therefore asked whether the new GG system was retrospectively associated with biochemical disease-free survival in a mixed-ethnicity cohort of Asian men.

A total of 680 radical prostatectomies (RPs) from 2005 to 2014 were included. GS from initial biopsy and RP were compared and used to allocate cases to GG, defined as: 1 (GS≤6); 2 (GS 3+4=7); 3 (GS 4+3=7); 4 (GS 4+4=8/5+3=8/3+5=8) and 5 (GS 9–10). Biochemical recurrence was defined as two consecutive post-RP prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels of >0.2 ng/mL after post-RP PSA reaching the nadir of <0.1 ng/mL.

Our data showed that Kaplan–Meier analysis revealed significant differences in biochemical recurrence within Gleason GG based on either biopsy or prostatectomy scoring. Multivariate analysis further confirmed that a higher GG was significantly associated with risk of biochemical recurrence. This GG system had a higher prognostic discrimination for both initial biopsy and RP than GS.

Our study validates the use of the revised and updated GG system in a mixed-ethnicity population of Asian men. Higher GG was significantly associated with increased risk of biochemical recurrence. We therefore recommend its use to inform clinical management for patients with prostate cancer.