New insights into the etiological pathogenesis of Peyronie's disease

This paper reviews the current knowledge of the etiological pathogenesis of Peyronie's disease. De la Peyronie himself supposed a connection with venereal diseases. Herein, infectious, traumatic, autoimmune and genetic causes are discussed. An important hypothesis is that the recurrent microtraumatisation of the tunica albuginea during sexual intercourse leads to small lesions that activate processes of wound healing and development of fibrotic plaque. According to recent data, an association with the antigens of the HLA-system could be ruled out. Transforming growth factor beta (TGF-beta) seems to have an important impact due to its increased expression in the plaque. Furthermore it is possible to induce a condition similar to Peyronie's disease by intratunical injection of cytomodulin - a substance with TGF-beta-like activity - in an animal model. As in other fibrotic diseases, an imbalance between nitric oxide (NO) and reactive oxygen species (ROS) seems to be of importance. The most important new insights were gained from cell-culture models in which increased expression of basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF), as well as a change in cell cycle regulation (p53) and cytogenetic instability were observed.