Urethral involvement in female patients with bladder cancer. A study of 22 cystectomy specimens.

The cystectomy specimens of 22 female patients with various types of bladder cancer were studied for evidence of urethral involvement. The bladder showed high-grade invasive transitional cell carcinoma in 18 patients, in 14 cases in association with flat carcinoma in situ (multifocal in 11 cases and unifocal in three). Three patients had multifocal carcinoma in situ of the bladder without evidence of invasion, and one patient had multifocal high-grade noninvasive papillary carcinoma. Urethral carcinoma in situ was observed in four of 14 patients (29%) with multifocal carcinoma in situ of the bladder, in three cases extending into the periurethral glands. This frequent concurrence of carcinoma in situ of the bladder with urethral and periurethral gland involvement, analogous to the carcinomatous involvement of the prostatic urethra and ducts in male patients, warrants caution in the intravesical therapy of female patients with superficial bladder cancer. The urethra showed invasive carcinoma in three of 18 patients (17%) with invasive bladder cancer (stromal invasion in two cases and vascular invasion in one). This finding reconfirms the use of routine urethrectomy in conjunction with cystectomy in female patients with invasive bladder cancer. An incidental finding was the presence of condylomatous changes in the urethra in five cases (23%).