Imaging Technique Improves Bladder Tumor Surveillance

Blue flexible cystoscopy used in an office-setting can improve detection of bladder cancer recurrence, according to the findings of a phase 3 study presented at the 2017 American Urological Association annual meeting in Boston, by Siamak Daneshmand, MD, of the Keck School of Medicine at Southern California University in Los Angeles.

In the study, which included 304 patients at 17 academic institutions in the United States, 21.5% of recurrences were seen with blue light cystoscopy only. More than 90% of patients said the blue light flexible cystoscopy was a worthwhile procedure and would undergo it again. “This is important because there is an extra step to the procedure with the instillation of the agent [hexaminolevulinate HCl] into the bladder,” Dr. Daneshmand said.