Clinical outcomes and survival differences between primary, secondary and concomitants carcinoma in situ of urinary bladder treated with BCG immunotherapy

BACKGROUND: The carcinoma in situ (CIS) of urinary bladder is a flat, high-grade and aggressive manifestation of urothelial cancer which carries a great risk for progression to muscle invasive disease and metastatic spread. The aim of the study was to analyse the clinical history and survival differences between primary, secondary and concomitants CIS of the bladder. METHODS: We analysed a database of 301 patients who were treated between 1998 and 2017 in university BCG outpatient department. Primary, secondary and concomitants CIS cases were included in the study with minimum follow-up of 12 months. Recurrence-free survival (RSF), progression-free survival (PFS) and cancer specific survival (CSS) were analysed by Kaplan–Meier curves and log-rank test. Additionally, Cox regression models were performed. RESULTS: Seventy-two patients with primary, 58 with secondary and 171 with CIS concomitants were analysed. The patients were followed from mean 61,9 months. RFS rates at 5-years follow-up were 54.9%, 55.3% and 60.4% for primary, concomitants and secondary CIS (P>0.05). PFS rates at 5-years follow-up were 65.8%, 72.1% and 77% for primary, concomitants and secondary CIS (P>0.05). CSS rates at 5-years follow-up were 83.1%, 81.9% and 90.1% for primary, concomitants and secondary CIS (P>0.05). There were no statistically significant differences between any CIS subtype in any of analysed endpoints in multivariate analysis. Female gender was associated with worse RFS and the instillation number was positively associated with all analysed survival rates. On contrary, age was not statistically related to RFS, PFS nor CSS. CONCLUSIONS: In this study it was shown that when compared with secondary and concomitants CIS, primary CIS presented the worst RFS and PFS, however, the differences between subgroups were not statistically significant.