THE NATIONAL-CANCER-DATA-BASE REPORT ON BLADDER-CARCINOMA

BACKGROUND. Previous Commission on Cancer Data from the National Cance r Data Base (NCDB) have examined time trends in stage of disease, trea tment patterns, and survival for selected cancers. The most current (1 993) data relating to patients with bladder carcinoma are described he re. METHODS. Five calls for data have yielded a total of 3,700,000 cas es for the years 1985 through 1993, including 447,679 cases for 1988 a nd 608,593 cases for 1993, from hospital cancer registries across the U.S. Data were received on 18,053 bladder carcinoma cases in 1988 and 22,606 cases in 1993. RESULTS. Interesting trends are 1) younger patie nts (49 years of age and younger) present with earlier stages of disea se than do older patients; 2) women are slightly more likely to be dia gnosed with later stages (II, III, and IV) of bladder carcinoma than m en; 3) African Americans are less likely to be diagnosed with Stage 0 or Stage I disease than either Hispanic or non-Hispanic whites; and 4) National Cancer Institute designated centers treat more patients with advanced disease than do other types of hospitals. CONCLUSIONS. The N CDB data are important for analyzing what cancer treatments and outcom es are used and occurring in the country. The data suggest that Africa n Americans are diagnosed at later stages of disease progression. The relative survival rates among African Americans are lower than among H ispanics or non-Hispanic whites. Also, the decreasing utility of adjuv ant chemotherapy is being recognized. (C) 1996 American Cancer Society .