What is the role of androgen deprivation therapy in the treatment of locally advanced prostate cancer?

Overview

This Practice Point commentary discusses the paper by Horwitz and colleagues, which reported the long-term results of the RTOG 92-02 trial in which patients with locally advanced, node-negative prostate cancer who were treated with neoadjuvant-concurrent hormone ablation therapy and external beam radiation therapy (70 Gy) were subsequently randomized to receive either no further androgen deprivation or long-term (2-year) goserelin therapy. The results at 10 years confirm biochemical and clinical outcome benefits with the use of long-term androgen deprivation therapy for patients treated with conventional-dose radiotherapy. How these results should best be incorporated into dose-escalated radiotherapeutic approaches remains unclear, however, and this issue requires further investigation.