Primary urethral cancer: treatment patterns and associated outcomes.

Abstract

OBJECTIVES:

To evaluate treatment patterns and associated outcomes of patients with urethral cancer.

PATIENTS AND METHODS:

After obtaining institutional review board approval we identified 165 patients treated for primary urethral cancer between 1956 and 2017. Treatment included monotherapy (surgery or radiation), dual therapy (surgery+radiation, surgery+chemotherapy, or chemotherapy+radiation) or triple therapy (surgery+radiation+chemotherapy). Rates of different treatments were described by treatment year. The association between treatment type and outcomes was evaluated with multivariable Cox regression models, adjusting for disease characteristics.

RESULTS:

The study cohort included 74 men and 91 women, with a median age of 61 years. Common histologies were squamous cell (36%), urothelial (27%) and adenocarcinoma (25%). At presentation, 72% of patients had invasive disease, 24% had nodal involvement, and 5% had metastases. Treatment included monotherapy (57%), dual therapy (21%), and triple therapy (10%). The use of monotherapy decreased over time, while rates of dual therapy remained consistent, and rates of triple therapy increased. The median follow-up was 4.7 years. Estimated 5-year local recurrence-free, disease-specific and overall survival were 51%, 48% and 41%, respectively. Monotherapy was associated with decreased local recurrence-free survival after adjusting for stage, histology, sex and year of treatment (P = 0.017). There was no evidence that treatment type was associated with distant recurrence, cancer-specific or overall survival.

CONCLUSIONS:

We found preliminary evidence that multimodal therapy, more commonly used in recent years, was of benefit in patients with primary urethral cancer. This finding should be confirmed in further studies involving multiple centres because of the low incidence of the disease.

• Authors: Roy Mano, Emily A Vertosick, Joseph Sarcona, Daniel D Sjoberg, Nicole E Benfante, Timothy F Donahue, Harry W Herr, S Machele Donat, Bernard H Bochner, Guido Dalbagni, Alvin C Goh
• Journal: BJU international (BJU Int) Vol. 126 Issue 3 Pg. 359-366 (09 2020) ISSN: 1464-410X [Electronic] England
• PMID: 32336001 (Publication Type: Journal Article, Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't)
• Copyright: © 2020 The Authors BJU International © 2020 BJU International Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Topics

• Adult
• Aged
• Cohort Studies
• Combined Modality Therapy
• Female
• Humans
• Male
• Middle Aged
• Retrospective Studies
• Treatment Outcome
• Urethral Neoplasms (therapy)