Surveillance and Screening for Bladder Cancer

Bladder cancer is a very treatable tumor if detected early.

Bladder cancer stage Ta, CIS and T1 is usually treated endoscopically via resection. Adjuvant treatment with intravesical administration of mitomycin C and BCG is often used to decrease the chances of tumor recurrence.

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[col type=”three-fourth last”]It is critical to continue regular surveillance of bladder cancer based on the guidelines recommended by NCCN (national cancer care network) as bladder tumors have a tendency to recur fairly unpredictably. When bladder cancer recurs, early in the process the patient may have no symptoms and as a result regular surveillance is important. The tumor detected before it causes symptoms is more likely to be curable and treatable. If the tumor recurs and is detected early endoscopic resection is possible however delay in diagnosis may lead to tumor progression to stage T2 or greater which decreases the chance of cure.

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Currently population screening for bladder cancer with urinalysis looking for microscopic hematuria is not recommended. However it is possible that selective approach to screening high-risk population of patients with risk factors and in high-prevalence areas may be useful.