Body mass index does not improve the ability to predict biochemical recurrence after radical prostatectomy

Purpose: To test whether body mass index (BMI) improves pre- or post-operative biochemical recurrence (BCR) predictions after radical prostatectomy. Materials and methods: Pre- and post-operative data were available in 2416 and 2499 men, respectively. Cox regression models addressed the association between BMI and the rate of BCR after adjusting for pre- and post-operative predictors. Predictive accuracy was quantified using Harrell's concordance index, with and without BMI and subjected to 200 bootstraps to reduce overfit bias. Differences in predictive accuracy were compared using the Mantel-Haenszel test. Results: After adjusting for either pre- or post-operative variables, increasing BMI was a statistically independent risk factor of BCR in both models (both p ≤ 0.003). Its addition to pre- and post-operative variables respectively increased predictive accuracy measures from 69.6 to 70.2% (+0.6%, p = 0.7) and from 78.1 to 78.4% (+0.3%, p = 0.8). Conclusion: Our data emphasise that despite its significance, inclusion of BMI into models, to predict BCR, does not improve their accuracy. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.