Bladder Tumor Markers: From Hematuria To Molecular Diagnostics – Where Do We Stand?
UroToday.com – Bladder cancer is an extremely lethal disease occurring in a large number of patients each year. Most evaluations that result in the diagnosis of bladder cancer are initiated with the finding of either gross or microscopic hematuria. While the majority of patients with hematuria will not have bladder cancer, a sizeable proportion will. Furthermore, a regimen of invasive and frequent surveillance is often undertaken to evaluate for and diagnose recurrent lesions as early as possible. A recent study has shown that in our state of Florida, USA, the rate of detection of advanced bladder cancer has very marginally decreased over the last 25 years, with the rates of detection of carcinoma in situ being markedly increased. This study found that the overall mortality rate of bladder cancer, depending on the ethnic group, has changed little over the last two decades.1 Evaluation of the SEER database for national and local statistics reveals that the mortality of bladder cancer na
