Urothelial tumors of upper tract following treatment of primary bladder transitional cell carcinoma

We studied, retrospectively, the incidence of upper tract urothelial tumors following the treatment of primary transitional cell carcinoma of the bladder in 638 patients. Subsequent tumor development was found in 20 patients (3.1 %) with a mean latency interval between initial treatment of the bladder cancer and diagnosis of the upper urinary tract tumor of eighty months. We did not find a significant difference among treatment modalities on the incidence of upper tract occurrences. Other than carcinoma in situ, tumor stage was not an independent predictive variable.