THE ROLE OF TRANSRECTAL ULTRASOUND IN THE EVALUATION OF DIFFERENT PROSTATIC LESIONS

Abstract

The prostate is an exocrine gland composed of both glandular and non glandular tissue. The prostate is the most frequently diseased organ in men. Many benign and malignant pathological conditions can affect the prostate. The most common prostatic diseases. are benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH) and carcinoma.

A variety of radiological modalities have been used for imaging of the prostate conventional radiologic techniques-intravenous urogram (IVU), voiding cystourethrogram (VCUG) and retrograde urathrogram­ depend on evidence of prostatic enlargement or contour distortion to identify prostatic pathology, and thus have a very limited role in the evaluation of prostatic diseases.

The ability to depict intraprostatic diseases has markedly improved with the advent of cross-sectional imaging modalities, such as CT, USA and MRI.

Computed tomography has been shown to be unable to visualize intraglandular changes. It has some paitfalls in staging of extracapsular extension of carcinoma, since the tumour and other soft tissue have similar X-ray attenuation. C.T. has high accuracy in evaluation of nodal metastases ranged from 63% to 67% (Naryon and Foster, 1991).

Recent developments in Ultrasound teclmology have made US one of the most reliable diagnostic modalities for evaluation of the prostate via the suprapubic, perineal, transurethral and transrectal approaches.