Prevalence of Clinically Concealed Prostatic Diseases at Post Mortem: A Teaching Hospital Experience in South-South, Nigeria

Background: Most post-mortem studies on prostate gland are limited to malignant prostatic tumours.
The possibilities of finding other histological types of prostatic diseases were worth exploring bearing
in mind that Nodular hyperplasia and cancer are of epidemiological importance.
Aim: This study aims to determine the pattern of prostatic diseases at post-mortem among individuals
not previously diagnosed with prostate disease and who died from other causes.
Materials and Methods: Prostate glands at post-mortem were obtained from individuals who died
from non-prostate related causes, weighed, fixed in 10% neutral buffered formalin, processed and
histologically analysed. Biodata and clinical diagnoses were obtained using clinical case notes and
post-mortem register.
Results: The population under study were 86 adult males whose ages ranged from 30 to 85 years
with a mean age of 52.71 ± 13.10 years. Ninety-three percent (93% / 80 cases) of the study
population were afflicted with prostatic diseases at post-mortem. The most common lesion was
nodular hyperplasia. Latent or occult adenocarcinoma followed this, prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia
and Schistosomiasis in decreasing order of frequency. The frequency of occult adenocarcinoma,
prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PIN) and nodular hyperplasia increased significantly with age (P ≤
0.05). The peak age for the development of occult adenocarcinoma, PIN and nodular hyperplasia was
in the 6th, 8th and 6th decades respectively.
Conclusion: Clinically concealed prostatic diseases are common findings at post-mortem. There is a
significant increase (P ≤ 0.05) in the frequency of covert prostatic diseases (nodular hyperplasia, PIN
and adenocarcinoma) with advancing age. Convert prostatic diseases especially nodular hyperplasia
and prostatic carcinoma have the potentials of contributing significantly to the burden of health care
and the cost of receiving treatment if the life expectancy improves in our environment in particular and
Nigeria in general.