AIMTo investigate whether chronic bacterial prostatitis might increase oxidative stress and oxidative damage in chronic bacterial prostatitis patients (CBPP), and to explore its possible mechanism.

METHODSEnrolled in a case-control study were 70 randomly sampled CBPP and 70 randomly sampled healthy adult volunteers (HAV), on whom plasma nitric oxide (NO), vitamin C (VC), vitamin E (VE) and beta-carotene (beta-CAR) level, erythrocyte malondialdehyde (MDA) level, as well as erythrocyte superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and glutathione peroxidase (GPX) activities were determined by spectrophotometry.

RESULTSCompared with the HAV group, values of plasma NO and erythrocyte MDA in the CBPP group were significantly increased (P < 0.001); those of plasma VC, VE and beta-CAR as well as erythrocyte SOD, CAT and GPX activities in the CBPP group were significantly decreased (P < 0.001). Findings from partial correlation for the 70 CBPP showed that with prolonged course of disease, values of NO and MDA were gradually increased (P < 0.001), and those of VC, VE, beta-CAR, SOD, CAT and GPX were gradually decreased (P < 0.05-0.001). The findings from stepwise regression for the 70 CBPP suggested that the model was Y = -13.2077 + 0.1894MDA + 0.0415NO - 0.1999GPX, F = 18.2047, P < 0.001, r = 0.6729, P < 0.001.

CONCLUSIONThe findings suggest that there exist increased oxidative stress and oxidative damage induced by chronic bacterial prostatitis in the patients, and such phenomenon was closely related to the course of disease.