Catto - Figure 31
Bladder Sparing Surveillance
FIG. 31: What if the physician undertakes bladder-sparing surveillance? This Figure shows time to progression (left panel) from the EORTC study[18] and time to recurrence (right panel) from the UK University of Sheffield study.[28]
Both sides of the Figure show that both local progression and local recurrence rates are higher in the first 12 months, before they plateau over the next 24−48−60 months. Therefore if the physician is to try bladder-sparing, surveillance should be focused on these periods of highest risk. My personal recommendation is to check the bladder at 3-monthly intervals during the first year, 6-monthly during the second year, and then 6-monthly to annually over the next 5 years.
References
Sylvester RJ, van der Meijden AP, Oosterlinck W, et al. Predicting recurrence and progression in individual patients with stage Ta T1 bladder cancer using EORTC risk tables: a combined analysis of 2596 patients from seven EORTC trials. Eur Urol. 2006;49;466−77 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eururo.2005.12.031
Thomas F, Rosario DJ, Rubin N, et al. The long-term outcome of treated high-risk nonmuscle-invasive bladder cancer: time to change treatment paradigm? Cancer 2012;118:5525−34 https://doi.org/10.1002/cncr.27587
