Studies show that image-guided fusion biopsy—in which an MRI image is "fused" with the transrectal ultrasound image normally used to guide prostate biopsies—performs better than standard ultrasound-guided biopsy at detecting prostate cancers. However, few studies have evaluated fusion biopsy’s performance in detecting prostate cancer in non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic men.

In a study published online on April 21 in the Journal of Urology, Kara L. Watts, M.D., and colleagues reviewed the records of 410 men—49% identified as non-Hispanic Black, 30.5% identified as Hispanic and 20.5% identified as non-Hispanic white—who underwent fusion-guided biopsy at Montefiore Medical Center. They found that biopsies guided by the newer technique detected more prostate cancers among non-Hispanic Black men compared with non-Hispanic white men and Hispanic men, who had similar likelihoods of prostate cancer detection. The findings suggest that, particularly for non-Hispanic Black men, suspicious prostate lesions detected using MRI/ultrasound imaging may have higher likelihood of representing prostate cancer and therefore should be biopsied.

Dr. Watts is an assistant professor of urology at Einstein. Laena Hines, M.D., a resident at University of Rochester Medical Center, and Denzel Zhu, a research fellow at Einstein, are co-first authors of the study.