Cancer Outside The Bladder Wall

Urothelial cancer can happen in the kidneys and ureters too but it s much more common in the bladder.

Cancer outside the bladder wall.

It was a small cell carcinoma. Stages ii to iv denote invasive cancer. For patients with metastatic disease at presentation or those in which bladder cancer cells are present outside the bladder wall or in lymph nodes during radical cystectomy systemic usually intravenous chemotherapy is the treatment of choice. Bladder cancer usually starts in the lining or inner layer of the bladder wall.

In stage iv the cancer has metastasized from the bladder to the lymph nodes or to other organs or bones. Although urothelial carcinomas bladder cancers always start at the inner lining of the bladder as they grow they can burrow deeper and enlarge within or through the wall of the bladder while not increasing in size within the cavity of the bladder. Bladder cancer most often begins in the cells urothelial cells that line the inside of your bladder. Next is a thick layer of muscle.

The cancer has spread to the bladder or rectum and possibly nearby lymph nodes. Over time they can spread deeper into the other layers. As the cancer grows through the layers of the bladder wall it becomes harder to treat. The transitional epithelium on the picture is the lining layer where most bladder cancers start.

In stage iii the cancer has spread to the fatty tissue outside the bladder muscle. The median ageof diagnosis is 69 for men and 71 for women. T4 means cancer has grown outside the bladder or into the prostate womb or vagina or into the wall of the pelvis the area between the hip bones or tummy abdomen your doctor also looks at. During the surgery the surgeon saw a spot on the outside of her bladder so he removed it and biopsied it.

The cancer is in the bladder rectum or organs far from the uterus such as the lungs. Outside of this muscle a layer of fatty connective tissue separates the bladder from other nearby organs. Whether cancer has spread to any lymph nodes this is called the n stage. But my daughter saw a urologist who did a blue light cystoscopy which showed 2 spots on the inside of the bladder which were not muscle invasive.

Beneath the urothelium is a thin layer of connective tissue blood vessels and nerves. Nearly all bladder cancers start in the lining or urothelium. The surgeon was 100 sure his words that he got it all.