Molecular Diagnostics in Prostate Cancer

Since there are no effective therapeutic options for advanced prostate cancer, early detection of this tumour is pivotal and can increase the curative success rate. Although the routine use of serum PSA testing has undoubtedly increased prostate cancer detection, one of its main drawbacks has been the lack of specificity that results in a high negative biopsy rate. Since prostate cancer is a heterogeneous disease, it has become clear that a defined set of markers will provide significantly more diagnostic information than any one biomarker. The list of potential prostate cancer biomarkers will continue to grow. Only when research groups use the proposed guidelines for biomarker development, then systematic evaluation and clinical investigation of these biomarkers will gain more insight into their true diagnostic potential.