الصفات السريرية والباثولوجية لسرطان المثانة الاولي في مشافي جامعة دمشق

Background & Objective: Bladder cancer is the second most common urogenital tumor. The stage, grade, number and diameter of urinary bladder cancer is an important factors in determining prognosis of the disease. Early diagnosis and proper treatment are also critical to improve survival. This retrospective study was performed to determine the clinico-pathological features of primary bladder cancer at first presentation at Damascus University hospitals. Material & Method: From Jan 2009 to June 2010, we retrospectively evaluated 96 patients with primary bladder cancer. All patients were evaluated with regards to clinical presentation, cystoscopic findings and histo-pathological data. Results: Our study population (96 patients) comprised 18.75% females and 81.25% males. The median age was 62 years (range:38–72), 62 patients (64.58%) had history of cigarette smoking. Most patients (82.29%) presented with painless hematuria. Primary transitional cell carcinoma was the most common (i.e. 94.79%) histological variety of bladder carcinoma. We found that 23.96% of patients had (Ta) cancer, 41.67% had tumor with subepithelial connective tissue invasion (T1), 34.38% of patients had muscle invasive tumors (≥T2) and 5.21% were associated with (CIS) at the time of presentation. Regional or distant metastases were found in 6.25% of patients. Well differentiated tumor (G1) was seen in 33.33% of the patients, moderately differentiated tumor (G2) was found in 29.17% and poorly differentiated tumor (G3) was found in 37.5% of the patients. Conclusion: Most bladder tumours in our study are TCCs, and majority of them are in T1 stage. They are more common in men than in women and the incidence increases with age. Macroscopic hematuria is the most common symptom. Awareness is needed among the public and treating physicians as they tend to neglect the symptoms of hematuria, resulting in an advanced stage of bladder cancer at presentation. an‎d the situation can be further improved by the awareness about smoking risks, adopting proper screening programs and performing appropriate investigations.