Management of bone metastases in prostate cancer: a review

Purpose of review Bone metastases in the advanced stages of prostate cancer have a detrimental effect on the quality of life, resulting in skeletal-related events and pain and place a significant burden on healthcare resources. Improvements in prostate cancer treatment have led to a longer survival of patients. Therefore, quality of life is of growing interest and importance. Successful management and prevention of the complications of bone metastasis in those patients remains, however, clinically challenging. Recent findings Recently, radium-223 was approved as a treatment for bone metastasis in patients with prostate cancer, joining zoledronic acid, denosumab and other radiopharmaceuticals in the clinical armamentarium. Radium-223 has shown to improve overall survival in patients with bone metastasis. Summary This review focuses on the recent landmark studies on zoledronic acid, denosumab and radium-223 for patients with metastatic prostate cancer and gives a comprehensive overview of their mechanism of action, efficacy, dosage and safety profile.