Efficacy of fluorescent cystoscopy-assisted transurethral resection in patients with non-muscle invasive bladder cancer and quality of surgery: post-hoc analysis of а prospective randomized study.

This paper aims to evaluate the influence of quality of transurethral resection in patients with non-muscle invasive bladder cancer on the benefit of fluorescent cystoscopy-assisted transurethral resection in the post hoc analysis of the single-center randomized controlled trial.

We retrospectively analyzed the results of the prospective randomized study assessing the efficacy of fluorescent cystoscopy-assisted transurethral resection. The quality of transurethral resection was defined on the basis of a separate retrospective study estimating the variability in recurrence risk for the individual surgeon. The subgroup analysis of fluorescent cystoscopy-assisted transurethral resection efficacy depending on surgical experience was performed.

Of 377 eligible patients, transurethral resection was performed in 365 (97%) by surgeons with available grading information. Two 'experienced' surgeons performed 238 (63%) of all transurethral resections and three 'less experienced' surgeons completed 127 (34%) surgeries. The two surgical groups were comparable with respect to basic prognostic factors and subsequent therapy. The median follow-up was 56 months.In the total cohort of patients, fluorescent cystoscopy significantly decreased the risk of recurrence with hazard ratio 0.58 (p = 0.004). In the 'experienced surgeons' subgroup the benefit of fluorescent cystoscopy was not significant (hazard ratio 0.81, p = 0.34), whereas the 'less experienced' subgroup showed a marked difference in favor of fluorescent cystoscopy-assisted transurethral resection (hazard ratio 0.31, p = 0.001), with a P-value for interaction of 0.021.

Baseline quality of surgery may be a significant interacting factor affecting the magnitude of the benefit of fluorescent cystoscopy-assisted transurethral resection in patients with non-muscle invasive bladder cancer.

Central European journal of urology. 2019 Sep 26 [Epub]

Alexander Rolevich, Alexander Minich, Vladimir Vasilevich, Alexander Zhegalik, Andrey Mokhort, Tatiana Nabebina, Sergey Krasny, Sergey Polyakov, Oleg Sukonko

Department of Urology and Pathology, N.N. Alexandrov National Research Cancer Center, Minsk, Belarus., Department of Pathology, N.N. Alexandrov National Research Cancer Center, Minsk, Belarus.