Radical radiotherapy is a viable treatment option for invasive bladder cancer

We performed an audit of 169 patients treated for invasive bladder cancer between 1996 and 2000, in Leeds, UK, 97 of whom had radical radiotherapy, while 89 had undergone surgery. We found no significant difference in cause specific survival rates between the two groups: 56.8 per cent for radiotherapy patients compared with 53.4 per cent of surgery-treated patients at five years, despite the radiotherapy group being older (75.3 years versus 68.2 years), and no difference in recurrence rates. Until now, cystectomy has been considered the ‘gold standard’ treatment for muscle invasive bladder cancer, but our older, less fit radiotherapy patients did as well as the younger, fitter surgical patients. Bladder cancer is a disease of older people, so radiotherapy will play an increasingly important role as the population ages, and this study encourages us to believe that such elderly patients will not be disadvantaged by having an alternative curative treatment to surgery for their bladder cancer.

Bibliographic Reference

Kotwal S et al.: "Similar treatment outcomes for radical cystectomy and radical radiotherapy in invasive bladder cancer treated at a United Kingdom specialist treatment center", Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2008 Feb 1;70(2):456-63

Anne Kiltie

 Pyrah Department of Urology, St. James's University Hospital, The Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, Leeds, United Kingdom