Objectives. To investigate whether the frequency of chromosome abnormalities in peripheral blood lymphocytes defined as the aneuploidy index in blood (AnIB) can be used as a clinical marker of early age onset, androgen response, and metastasis in human prostate cancer.

Methods. Peripheral blood samples were collected from 80 patients with prostate cancer, and chromosome preparations were made from 72-hour cultures after mitotic block. The AnIB of 59 informative cases was compared with several parameters, including age at disease onset, Gleason grade of tumor, clinical stage of tumor, metastasis, and prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level.

Results. Patients with AnIB levels greater than 3 had a significantly higher incidence of metastasis (P = 0.022), androgen-independent disease (P = 0.002), and early age at disease onset (age at diagnosis less than 65 years) (P = 0.002) compared with the patients with lower AnIB (less than 3) levels. In addition, patients with AnIB levels greater than 5 had higher PSA levels (greater than 20 ng/mL) (P = 0.029) than patients with AnIB levels less than 5.

Conclusions. Chromosome abnormalities can be detected in the peripheral lymphocytes of patients with prostate cancer, and AnIB can be used as an early diagnostic and predictive marker for prostate cancer metastasis and androgen-independent disease.