Aim: The measurement of the volume of the prostate gland can have an influence on many clinical decisions. Various imaging methods have been used to measure it. Our aim was to conduct the first systematic review of their accuracy.
Methods: The literature describing the accuracy of imaging methods for measuring the prostate gland volume was systematically reviewed. Articles were included if they compared volume measurements obtained by medical imaging with a reference volume measurement obtained after removal of the gland by radical prostatectomy. Correlation and concordance statistics were summarised.
Results: 28 articles describing 7768 patients were identified. The imaging methods were ultrasound, computed tomography, and magnetic resonance imaging (US, CT, and MRI). Wide variations were noted but most articles about US and CT provided correlation coefficients that lay between 0.70 and 0.90, while those describing MRI seemed slightly more accurate at 0.80-0.96. When concordance was reported, it was similar; over- and underestimation of the prostate were variably reported. Most studies showed evidence of at least moderate bias and the quality of the studies was highly variable.
Discussion: The reported correlations were moderate to high in strength indicating that imaging is sufficiently accurate when quantitative measurements of prostate gland volume are required. MRI was slightly more accurate than the other methods.