Introduction: Upper tract urothelial carcinoma (UT-UC) is an uncommon disease with pronounced difference in 5-year survival for noninvasive (96%) versus invasive (17%) disease. High survival rate of early disease questioned the accepted norm of using radical nephroureterectomy (RNU) for all stages. This review assesses effectiveness of endoscopic management for UT-UC.
Methods: A review of 131 UT-UC patients seen between January 1999 and October 2009 was performed. Demographic, clinicopathologic, and outcomes data were collected and compared between patients initially managed with RNU versus those initially managed with nephron-sparing surgery (NSS). The chi-square or Fisher's exact tests for categorical variables and the Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney test for continuous variables were used. Clinical and pathologic stages of RNU patients were evaluated with chi-square testing, whereas difference in length of stay was detected using linear regression. Recurrence rates were compared using multivariate Cox regression.
Results: The two arms had similar distributions of age, sex, frequency of medical comorbidities, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA), and Charlson scores. Mean-adjusted length of stay was 2.1 (95% confidence interval [1.6, 2.5]) and 5.5 days (95% confidence interval [5.3, 6.4]) for the NSS and RNU groups, respectively (p < 0.001). Comparison of clinical and pathologic stages of RNU patients showed a difference (p < 0.001), with under-staging noted in 32%. Men (Hazards Ratio = 2.9 [1.5-5.5], p = 0.001) and NSS patients (hazards ratio [HR] = 3.5 [1.7-7.3], p < 0.001) had threefold increased recurrence risk.
Conclusion: NSS offered shorter hospital stay but had increased risk of recurrence. Therefore, extreme care should be made to rule out occult invasive tumors preoperatively. Patients being managed endoscopically must be informed of the necessity for close follow-up.