In 2020, approximately 81,000 cases of urothelial carcinoma of the bladder will be diagnosed in the United States, with nearly 18,000 associated deaths.1 Bladder cancer disproportionally affects men and is associated with well-defined environmental risk factors—tobacco use underlies approximately 50% of cases.2 Nonmuscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) is primarily managed by transurethral resection, risk-stratified use of intravesical chemotherapeutic or immunotherapeutic agents, and close surveillance.
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The Latest Research on Bladder Cancer
Bladder Cancer Advances in 2020 and 2021
Bladder cancer continues to afflict more than 80,000 patients in the United States and at least 550,000 persons globally.1,2 Although the scientific community could not meet in person last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this did not stop the ongoing exchange of ideas, research, and clinical trials. In this article, I highlight some of the most important advances in non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) and the key data to anticipate in 2021.

Ashish Kamat, MD, MBBS, is a Professor of Urology and Cancer Research and Wayne B. Duddleston Professor of Cancer Research at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Dr. Kamat serves as President of International Bladder Cancer Group, (IBCG), and Co-President of International Bladder Cancer Network.



In 2020, approximately 81,000 cases of urothelial carcinoma of the bladder will be diagnosed in the United States, with nearly 18,000 associated deaths.1 Bladder cancer disproportionally affects men and is associated with well-defined environmental risk factors—tobacco use underlies approximately 50% of cases.2 Nonmuscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) is primarily managed by transurethral resection, risk-stratified use of intravesical chemotherapeutic or immunotherapeutic agents, and close surveillance.

The detection of recurrent tumor is a benchmark by which the success of intravesical agents is determined. Because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will now consider data from single-arm trials for patients with Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG)-unresponsive bladder cancer, the complete response (CR) rates (i.e. absence of disease on biopsy) is a key factor that impacts the success of many registration studies.

Published Date: September 2018
More than 81,000 individuals are diagnosed with bladder cancer in the United States every year, of whom 75% have non-muscle invasive disease.1,2 Unfortunately, half these cases recur despite transurethral resection of bladder tumor (TURBT), and from 5% to 25% of repeated recurrences progress to muscle-invasive disease.3,4,5

Until recently, decades had elapsed with little progress in treating metastatic urothelial cancer (mUC). Cisplatin-based chemotherapy, the best available treatment option, had a median overall survival (OS) of 12-15 months, an overall response rate (ORR) of 50-60%, and was curative in about 10% of cases, but also was associated with potentially serious toxicities.12, 13, 2, 7, 3

Urothelial cancer (UC), also known as transitional cell carcinoma, is the 5th most common cancer in the United States, and it arises more commonly in the bladder than in other parts of the urinary tract. An estimated 79,030 new cases of UC are expected in 2017. Of these cases, there will be about 12,240 deaths in men and 4630 in women.
















































































The rapid spread of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the betacoronavirus SARS-CoV-2, throughout the world has had dramatic effects on healthcare systems with impacts far beyond the patients actually infected with COVID-19. Patients who manifest severe forms of COVID-19 requiring respiratory support typically require this for prolonged durations,
Read MoreThere have been several recent single-arm trials in the Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) unresponsive non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) setting. The first question that arises is whether these single-arm trials are enough or do we need to randomize patients for our future trials.
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