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To develop an in vitro model that tests the involvement of prostatic stroma in the active reciprocal interactions between malignant epithelial cells and nerves that occur in perineural invasion.Each of three metastatic prostate cancer cell lines (LnCaP, PC3, and DU-145 at 10(3)) was co-cultured in sextuplet experiments with a human prostate stromal cell line (HTS-40C at 10(3)) and a mouse dorsal root ganglion in matrigel for 13 days. Carcinoma/ganglia co-cultures (10(6) cells) in the absence of stroma served as controls. Areas of carcinoma cell growth (day 1), neurite growth (days 1 and 3), and perineural invasion (neuroepithelial halo area, day 11) were quantified.Mean neurite outgrowth was enhanced in the presence of stroma with LnCaP and PC3, but not with DU-145. Perineural invasion and carcinoma cell growth were enhanced in the presence of stroma in experiments with all three cell lines. The mean cell area (in square millimeters) increased 54.7% with LnCaP in the presence of stroma (P0.001). PC3 and DU-145 growth was enhanced 88.5% and 43.4%, respectively, in the presence of stroma. The mean neurite growth (in millimeters) on days 1 and 3 increased 50.8% and 70.8% with LnCaP in the presence of stroma. This enhancement was observed with PC3 by 88.1% and 64.5%. The mean neurite growth decreased in the presence of stroma with DU-145 by 4.9% and 5.4%. Perineural invasion increased 33.8% in the presence of stroma with LnCaP and 24.3% and 26.1% with PC3 and DU-145, respectively.These novel findings strongly suggest active stromal participation in perineural invasion. The identification of specific stromal factors may suggest ways of preventing the progression of prostate cancer.

Purpose: In a single center retrospective study we previously reported superior dry rates and fewer artificial urinary sphincter revisions when the sphincter cuff was placed via the traditional perineal approach compared with a penoscrotal approach. A multicenter study was performed to compare the approaches further and explain the disparity in outcomes.Materials and Methods: We performed a retrospective review of 158 patients who underwent these procedures from April 1987 to October 2007 at 4 centers.Results: During 184 surgeries in 158 patients 201 artificial urinary sphincter cuffs were placed (90 penoscrotal and 111 perineal). Among patients with known followup the completely dry rate for single cuff artificial urinary sphincters was 17 of 62 (27.4%) in the penoscrotal group and 41 of 93 (44.1%) in the perineal group (p = 0.04). Continued incontinence necessitated subsequent tandem cuff in 7 of the 62 (11.3%) penoscrotal cases compared to only 5 of the 93 (5.4%) perineal cases. Cuff size in the penosc...