New Insights into Upper Tract Urothelial Carcinoma: What Changed?

Dear Colleagues,

Upper-tract urothelial carcinoma (UTUC) is an aggressive disease that is managed by radical or organ-sparing surgery. Upper-tract urothelial cancer (UTUC) lacks high-quality evidence to appraise current patterns of presentation, diagnosis, treatment and outcomes as a result of disease rarity and patient heterogeneity. An overall 5-year survival of 57% underlines the imperative importance of the implementation of an efficient follow-up scheme to detect recurrences as early as possible with the primary curative intention and yet not expose the patient to unnecessary examination risks. The goal is to obtain a curative setting after diagnosis and primary surgery for UTUC, which can be achieved through accurate and close FU. The impact of standardized regular surveillance on better oncological prognosis has already been investigated in several malignancies, including primary urothelial cancer of the bladder. Strict FU protocols detecting asymptomatic recurrence, occurring in up to 57% of patients after RNU, have been shown to potentially improve survival rates compared to patients with symptomatic recurrence This again considers the objective for regular surveillance in UTUC to achieve a better outcome based on early recurrence detection. To achieve this, the implementation of prospective randomized studies remains unfeasible, thus giving retrospective studies with standardized strict follow-up protocols a key imperative role.

This Special Issue presents up-to-date summaries related to the pathogenesis, diagnosis, prognostic assessment and management of UTUC.

Dr. Sisto Perdonà
Dr. Antonio Tufano
Guest Editors

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• upper urinary tract urothelial carcinoma
• radical nephroureterectomy
• ureterectomy
• UTUC
• metastasis