[Effect of hypercapnic hypoxia on chronic abacterial prostatitis].

AIM: To improve treatment results of patients with CAP using hypercapnic hypoxia as a part of an integrated therapy.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study involved 37 men aged 20 to 50 years diagnosed with CAP. The subjects were randomly divided into 2 groups. The control group consisted of 17 (46%) patients who received only the basic therapy. The study group comprised 20 (54%) patients, who were treated with the basic therapy combined with a course of 10 treatment sessions of hypercapnic hypoxia using a respiratory device. Two study visits were organized before and after treatment, including medical history, physical examination, filling out questionnaires, DRE and TRUS of the prostate, uroflowmetry and laser flowmetry.

RESULTS: In the both groups, the treatment resulted in reduction or relief of pain and dysuria that is a natural effect of the standard therapy. However, the study group showed significantly greater improvement. The findings of DRE and TRUS of the prostate in the study and control group did not differ significantly; the size of hypoechoic areas in the prostate decreased in the both groups. Laser flowmetry showed improvement in microcirculatory disturbances of the prostate, which were observed before treatment.

CONCLUSION: Basic therapy has a clinical effect, but it is limited regarding hemodynamics and microcirculation of the prostate. These indices are lower than in the study group. Thus, the study findings show a high clinical efficacy of hypercapnic hypoxia as an add-on therapy in treating patients with CAP. There was a significant decrease in clinical manifestations of the disease which was caused by improving microcirculation. This resulted from improved blood circulation, increased blood perfusion and blood volume in the arterioles, increased blood inflow in the microcirculatory system, reduced tissue hypoxia and ischemia, improved blood flow regulation. The findings of the present study give us ground to recommend training using breathing simulator "Karbonik" in the combination therapy of patients with CAP, which significantly increases the treatment effectiveness.