Further evaluation of uPA and PAI-1 as biomarkers for prostatic diseases

To assay for uPA and PAI-1 in prostate tissue from 40 patients with prostatic disease and to examine the robustness of the correlation of the uPA/PAI-1 ratio with benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and prostate cancer (PCa), previously identified in a different cohort of 62 patients.

uPA and PAI-1 were extracted from liquid N₂ frozen homogenised prostate tissue with TRIS/Triton pH 8.5 buffer and measured by ELISA (FEMTELLE).

The concentration of uPA (mean ± SD) was found to be 0.1177 ± 0.0266 (range 0.0070–0.7200; n = 30) and 0.1092 ± 0.0130 (range 0.0040–0.7800; n = 70) for PCa and BPH patients, respectively. The concentration of PAI-1 was found to be 5.236 ± 0.688 ng/mg protein (range 1.10–15.19; n = 30) and 4.975 ± 0.501 ng/mg protein (range 0.20–25.00; n = 70) for PCa and BPH patients, respectively. The mean uPA/PAI-1 ratio was found to be 0.0479 ± 0.0060 (range 0.0043–0.1200; n = 30) in PCa samples and was significantly higher than BPH samples where the ratio was 0.0332 ± 0.0023 (range 0.0040–0.0860; n = 70) (P = 0.0064). In PCa patients older than 68 years, the uPA/PAI-1 ratio was above 0.050 reaching 0.100 in 73-year-old patients.