Body mass index in relation to serum prostate‐specific antigen levels and prostate cancer risk

High Body mass index (BMI) has been directly associated with risk of aggressive or fatal prostate cancer. One possible explanation may be an effect of BMI on serum levels of prostate‐specific antigen (PSA). To study the association between BMI and serum PSA as well as prostate cancer risk, a large cohort of men without prostate cancer at baseline was followed prospectively for prostate cancer diagnoses until 2015. Serum PSA and BMI were assessed among 15,827 men at baseline in 2010–2012. During follow‐up, 735 men were diagnosed with prostate cancer with 282 (38.4%) classified as high‐grade cancers. Multivariable linear regression models and natural cubic linear regression splines were fitted for analyses of BMI and log‐PSA. For risk analysis, Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to estimate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) and natural cubic Cox regression splines producing standardized cancer‐free probabilities were fitted. Results showed that baseline Serum PSA decreased by 1.6% (95% CI: ?2.1 to ?1.1) with every one unit increase in BMI. Statistically significant decreases of 3.7, 11.7 and 32.3% were seen for increasing BMI‐categories of 25 < 30, 30 < 35 and ≥35 kg/m², respectively, compared to the reference (18.5 < 25 kg/m²). No statistically significant associations were seen between BMI and prostate cancer risk although results were indicative of a positive association to incidence rates of high‐grade disease and an inverse association to incidence of low‐grade disease. However, findings regarding risk are limited by the short follow‐up time. In conclusion, BMI was inversely associated to PSA‐levels. BMI should be taken into consideration when referring men to a prostate biopsy based on serum PSA‐levels.