Competing mortality contributes to excess mortality in patients with poor-risk lymph node-positive prostate cancer treated with radical prostatectomy.

BACKGROUND Factors predicting survival in men with lymph node-positive prostate cancer are still poorly defined. PATIENTS AND METHODS 193 prostate cancer patients with histopathologically proven lymph node involvement with a median follow-up of 7.3 years were studied. 94% of patients received immediate hormonal therapy. Kaplan-Meier curves were calculated to evaluate overall survival rates and compared with the log-rank test. Cumulative disease-specific and competing mortality rates were calculated by competing risk analysis and compared with the Pepe-Mori test. Cox proportional hazard models were used to determine the independent significance of predictors of all-cause mortality. RESULTS Age (70 years or older vs. younger), Gleason score (8-10 vs. 7 or lower) and the number of involved nodes (3 or more vs. 1-2) were identified as independent predictors of all-cause mortality. When patients with 0-1 of these risk factors were compared with those with 2-3 risk factors, all-cause (rates after 10 years 21% vs. 71%, p < 0.0001), disease-specific (12 vs. 37%, p = 0.009) and competing mortality (9 vs. 33%, p = 0.02) differed significantly. CONCLUSIONS Some of the excess mortality in patients with poor-risk lymph node-positive prostate cancer may be attributed to increased competing mortality, possibly caused by an interaction between comorbid diseases and hormonally treated persistent or progressive prostate cancer.