Serum Prostatic Specific Antigen Levels among Adult Male Patients Seen at Two Nigerian Tertiary Hospitals

Background: The clinical utilization of PSA test in early detection and monitoring therapy of cancer of prostate is influenced by demographic factors like age, geographical location, metabolic factors, method of analysis and sensitivity and specificity of the test. Hence, we retrospectively compared the serum PSA levels of adult male patients seen at two Nigerian tertiary hospitals.

Methodology: The retrospective study was conducted at two Nigerian tertiary hospitals, Federal medical centre, Yola and Makurdi between January and December 2019. Study participants were adult males with lower urinary tract symptoms presented at the Urology units and referred to the hospital chemical pathology laboratories for total PSA assay using quantitative method, Time –resolved Flourence immunoassay, Bioscience Diagnostic Technology Ltd, China. Data extracted includes,age, clinical details, and PSA levels. Descriptive analysis using SPSS version 21.0 was employed. A total of 430 data were extracted, 201 from Yola and 229 from Makurdi

Result: Significant difference was observed in the mean age, 61.67+0.09years vs 58.61+58.61years(p=0.009) and mean serum PSA level of patients21.88+3.04ng/ml vs 14.81+0.74ng/ml(p=0.041). Significant difference was observed in the mean serum PSA level(1.33+0.09ng/ml vs 1.65+0.08ng/ml)(p=0.011) of patients with PSA level (LUTS) within the range of <4ng/ml,and those with >10ng/ml(65.88+0.09 vs 40.43+3.66ng/ml)(p=0.003). 211(49.1%, 51.7 vs 46.7%)had PSA level 4ng/ml, 86(20%, 17.9% vs 21.8%)within 4-10ng/ml and 133(30.9%, 30.3 vs 31.4%) had >10ng/ml. No significant correlation was observed between PSA level and age, but increased with advancement in age. Diabetes Mellitus(DM)(0.9%) and co-existence of DM and hypertension(2.0%) were recorded as comorbidities

Conclusion: The study findings affirmed high PSA level and increase with age in suscepted cases of cancer of prostate. it serves as a baseline epidemiological template for further comprehensive study for better understanding of PSA level in clinical diagnosis and create awareness of the disease.