Abstract:Objective To investigate the diagnostic value of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) combined with serum stromal cell-derived factor-1 (SDF-1), free prostate-specific antigen (PSA) to total PSA ratio (f-PSA/t-PSA), and human epididymis protein 4 (HE4) in prostate cancer (PCa).Methods A total of 128 PCa patients admitted to the Hanzhong Central Hospital from October 2022 to October 2024 were enrolled as the PCa group, while 50 patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia were selected as the control group. MRI quantitative parameters and serum levels of SDF-1, f-PSA/t-PSA, and HE4 were compared between the two groups. Logistic regression analysis was used to identify influencing factors of PCa and construct a nomogram. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were generated to analyze the diagnostic efficacy of MRI combined with serum markers.Results The volume transfer constant (Ktrans), rate constant (Kep), and extracellular extravascular volume fraction (Ve) in the PCa group were significantly higher than those in the control group, while the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) was significantly lower (P < 0.05). The levels of SDF-1 and HE4 in the PCa group were higher than those in the control group, while the f-PSA/t-PSA ratio was lower than that in the control group (P < 0.05). Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that low ADC level [O^R = 0.478 (95% CI: 0.255, 0.895) ], high Ktrans [O^R = 2.114 (95% CI: 1.076, 4.156) ], high Kep [O^R = 2.465 (95% CI: 1.106, 5.497) ], high Ve [O^R = 2.541 (95% CI: 1.199, 5.388) ], high SDF-1 [O^R = 6.002 (95% CI: 2.725, 13.223) ], low f-PSA/t-PSA ratio [O^R = 0.434 (95% CI: 0.236, 0.798) ], and high HE4 [O^R = 3.335 (95% CI: 1.300, 8.554) ] were all independent risk factors for PCa (P < 0.05). ROC analysis demonstrated that the combined predictive model incorporating ADC, Ktrans, Kep, Ve, SDF-1, f-PSA/t-PSA, and HE4 achieved area under the curve of 0.984(95% CI:0.970,0.998), with a sensitivity of 95.3% (95% CI: 0.901, 0.983) and a specificity of 98.0% (95% CI: 0.894, 0.999).Conclusion MRI combined with serum SDF-1, f-PSA/t-PSA ratio, and HE4 has good diagnostic value for prostate cancer.