Introduction: Prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PIN) and atypical small acinar proliferation (ASAP) in the setting of prostatic needle biopsies are considered premalignant although questions still remain.
Objectives: In this paper, we have studied the clinical relevance of these histologic findings.
Material and methods: We collected 138 subjects (108 PIN, 30 ASAP); in 67% we performed a second biopsy and the rate of cancer in this late biopsy were 19% and 27% respectively. We cannot identify any clinical factor to predict the finding of cancer in the re-biopsy (PSA, age, digital rectal examination, prostatic volume).
Results: In the follow-up, we observed higher rates of cancer for the ASAP; the finding of ASAP was the single clinical or histopathological factor that was an independent predictor of cancer.
Conclusions: We observed that the finding of ASAP was an indication for re-biopsy because of the higher rates of cancer; on the contrary, the paper of PIN in the prostatic needle biopsy still requires further investigation.