Prostate cancer is the most common cancer affecting American men and the second leading cause of cancer deaths in the US. African-American men have the highest prostate cancer incidence and mortality rates in the world. OBJECTIVE: The purpose was to investigate differences across racial groups in the disease state and treatment of men hospitalized for prostate cancer. METHODS: Data Source - Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) hospital discharge data for 2002. Each record represents a patient discharge and includes patient demographics, diagnoses, procedures and charges for the stay. Study population includes all patients under 80 years old with a primary diagnosis of prostate cancer hospitalized in Florida during 2002. Analysis: SPSS was used to compare procedures, co-morbidities, and patient outcomes of discharge status, length-of-stay and total charges. Chi-Square tests and ANOVA were used to detect significant differences across racial groups. RESULTS: A total of 5444 men were included in the analysis. The average age was 64.5 years, with 73% of the patients Caucasian, 12% African-American, 11% Hispanic and 4% other races. Average length of stay was 3.3 days, costing about $23,000 per stay. Medicare was the primary payer for over 47% of the hospitalizations. Prostatectomy was performed on 81.5% of the patients with no significant differences across racial groups. Hypertension was reported in 41.5% of the patients, occurring significantly more in African American patients. On average, African Americans had significantly higher hospital charges and length of stay, yet were significantly younger than Caucasians. Finally, African Americans were more likely to have a discharge status of death than any other racial group. CONCLUSIONS: African American men hospitalized for prostate cancer have very different experiences than men of other racial groups. Further research is necessary to determine why this disparity occurs and how it might be attenuated.