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Posted on Feb 22, 2007, 9 a.m.
By Bill Freeman
Tall men seem to have a heightened risk of developing an enlarged prostate, also known as benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), a new study shows. Advancing age and high fasting blood sugar levels also raise the odds of BPH, whereas a greater systolic blood pressure -- the first number in the blood pressure reading - may indicate a lower risk.
Tall men seem to have a heightened risk of developing an enlarged prostate, also known as benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), a new study shows. Advancing age and high fasting blood sugar levels also raise the odds of BPH, whereas a greater systolic blood pressure -- the first number in the blood pressure reading - may indicate a lower risk.
One of the most common ailments in elderly men, BPH leads to bothersome lower urinary symptoms and is associated with complications such as urinary retention, bloody urine, stones, and urinary tract infections. Surgery may be required to relieve BPH.
Dr. Claus G. Roehrborn from University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas and colleagues studied the relationship among factors such as height, weight, blood pressure, blood sugar and lipid levels, and the development of BPH in roughly 1,200 Vietnam War veterans.
During follow-up lasting 15.6 years, 623 of the men developed BPH, and as expected, advancing age was an independent risk factor.
They also found increased height to be an independent predictor of BPH.
"It is entirely plausible that taller men have proportionally larger prostates," Roehrborn and colleagues report in the journal Urology, noting that in a previous study they found that men with larger prostates had a greater absolute increase in prostate volume over time.
"Thus, a positive relationship between height and BPH is not unexpected and is biologically plausible," the researchers point out.
There was no relationship between BPH and weight or body mass index (BMI) or with a change in weight or BMI over time. BMI is a measure of height in relation to weight and is often used to determine if a person is underweight or overweight.
These results only add to conflicting data already published, the researchers say.
Nonetheless, they note that "overall, the preponderance of evidence, especially considering the results from prospective studies, favors either no association or an inverse association between BMI or obesity and BPH or lower urinary tract symptoms."
Consistent with at least one other study, the Dallas study found that a greater systolic blood pressure - the first and larger of the two numbers that comprise a blood pressure reading - was associated with decreasing odds of BPH, whereas the diastolic blood pressure -- the second number -- had no effect. The mechanism of the association between blood pressure and BPH remains unknown.
The only metabolic patient factor positively linked to BPH was increasing fasting blood sugar levels, although this association was "small in magnitude." A larger proportion of diabetic men had BPH, but diabetes was not an independent predictor of BPH.
The researchers did not see a relationship for the development of BPH and HDL cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, triglycerides, total cholesterol or thyroid hormone levels.
