Superior metastasis-free survival for patients with high-risk prostate cancer treated with definitive radiation therapy compared to radical prostatectomy: A propensity score-matched analysis

For high-risk prostate cancer (HR-PCa) in men with a life expectancy of at least 10 years, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network recommends radiation therapy (RT) plus androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) with category 1 evidence or radical prostatectomy (RP) as an acceptable initial therapy. Randomized evidence regarding which therapy is optimal for disease control is lacking for men with HR-PCa. We performed a propensity-score-matched comparison of outcomes for men with localized HR-PCa treated with primary RT or RP. The medical records of patients with localized HR-PCa who were treated at our institution between 2002 and 2011 were reviewed. Patient and disease characteristics, treatment details, and outcomes were collected. A combination of nearest-neighbor propensity score matching on age, Adult Comorbidity Evaluation-27 comorbidity index, prostate-specific antigen, biopsy Gleason scores, and clinical T-stage as well as exact matching on prostate-specific antigen, biopsy Gleason scores, and clinical T-stage was performed. Outcomes were measured from diagnosis. Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression was used to compare metastasis-free and overall survival. A total of 246 patients were identified with 62 propensity-score-matched pairs. ADT was administered to 6.5% and 80.6% of patients receiving RP and RT, respectively. Five-year rates of metastasis for RP and RT were 33% and 8.9%, respectively ( P  = .003). Overall survival was not different. Delay of salvage therapy was longer for patients undergoing primary RT ( P  < .001). Findings were similar when only those patients who did not receive ADT were compared. At our institution, treatment with primary RT resulted in superior metastasis-free survival over RP. This was not accompanied by an improvement in OS.