Stage D1 Prostatic Adenocarcinoma: Significance of Nuclear DNA Ploidy Patterns Studied by Flow Cytometry

Flow cytometric analysis of nuclear DNA ploidy pattern was performed on 91 samples of prostatic adenocarcinoma from patients with stage D1 disease (metastatic deposits in pelvic lymph nodes). All patients had undergone radical retropubic prostatectomy and bilateral pelvic lymphadenectomy. Clinical follow-up ranged from 5 to 19 years. Nuclei were extracted from paraffin-embedded archival material. Isolated nuclei were stained with propidium iodide. The DNA ploidy pattern was diploid (normal) in 42% of tumors, tetraploid in 45%, and distinctly aneuploid in 13%. Only 15% of DNA diploid tumors progressed locally or systemically, whereas 75% of tumors with an abnormal DNA ploidy pattern (tetraploid or aneuploid) subsequently progressed (P