Epidemiology of chronic prostatitis.

Although there has been a recent surge of interest in chronic prostatitis, which hopefully will translate into advances in our understanding of the distribution and determinants of this condition, at present there is a scarcity of published epidemiologic research on chronic prostatitis. However, from the currently available epidemiologic studies, it appears that chronic prostatitis is common. In addition, studies of several determinants (i.e. age, race, region, infectious agents, uric acid, sexual activity, autoimmunity, prostate-specific antigen and prostate biopsy) may provide clues to the etiology of chronic prostatitis.