STUDIES ON PROSTATIC CANCER

TLDR

Malignant prostatic tumors arise from overgrowth of adult epithelial cells, which undergo atrophy when androgen levels are reduced, and recent advances in prostate investigation have improved understanding of this pathology. The study demonstrates that castration markedly improves the clinical condition of patients with advanced prostate cancer. Evidence that prostatic carcinoma consists of adult‑type epithelium comes from phosphatase activity studies showing optimal activity at pH5. Castration alleviates symptoms while androgen injection aggravates them, supporting a novel concept of prostatic carcinoma.

Abstract

The thesis of this work may be briefly summarized. In many instances a malignant prostatic tumor is an overgrowth of adult epithelial cells. All known types of adult prostatic epithelium undergo atrophy when androgenic hormones are greatly reduced in amount or inactivated. In this paper evidence is presented that significant improvement often occurs in the clinical condition of patients with far advanced cancer of the prostate after they have been subjected to castration. Conversely, the symptoms are aggravated when androgens are injected. We believe that this work provides a new concept of prostatic carcinoma. The evidence that prostatic carcinoma is often composed of an adult type of epithelium derives from a study of such tissue with respect to the phosphatase which manifests optimum activity at<i>p</i>H5. An important advance in the technic of investigation of the prostate gland was made by Kutscher and Wolbergs,¹who found that