Review: Introduction to Bladder Cancer

Here is what we have learned from Introduction to Bladder Cancer:

• Bladder cancer is the fourth most common cancer in men and the eighth most common in women.
• Carcinogens and inherited factors that make people less able to detoxify them seem to play a role in causing bladder cancer.
• Mushroom-shaped bladder tumors with their stem attached to the inner lining of the bladder are more common than solid tumors that grow directly in the lining of the bladder.
• Risk factors for bladder cancer include age, gender, race, smoking, occupation among others.
• For most bladder cancer patients,signs and symptoms include hematuria, dysuria, and other urinary symptoms—burning, frequency, urgency, pelvic discomfort after voiding.
• Transitional cell carcinoma accounts for more than 90 percent of all bladder cancers; about 8 percent of bladder cancers are the squamous cell type; adenocarcinomas account for about 2 percent of all bladder cancers.
• Prognosis and survival of bladder cancer correlate with stage and histologic grade.