A Review of Outcomes for Stage Ta Bladder Tumors

Using data from former reports, this study reviews and analyzes the outcomes of tumor recurrence, tumor progression, and tumor-specific survival of patients with stage Ta bladder tumors.

Data were collected from 19 longitudinal studies of outcomes after the first diagnosis of tumor and collected as individual patient results, that is, as failure times from the first tumor to any of the three outcomes. Altogether, there were 14,252 patients, including 4,050 for the outcome of tumor recurrence, 2,937 for the outcome of tumor progression, and 11,595 for the outcome of disease-specific survival (some patients were available for more than one outcome).

In these data, the mean time to additional tumors was 7.8 years, the mean time to an invasive tumor was 19.5 years, and the mean tumor-specific survival time was 27.2 years. All three outcomes were significantly related to the 2004 World Health Organization (WHO) tumor grades.

Although greater than 50% of those with stage Ta bladder tumors have additional bladder tumors, approximately 80% appear to follow a benign course without developing invasive tumors or dying of bladder cancer. The 2004 WHO grading scheme accounts for some but not all of the prognostic information.