title: Predicting survival after radical cystectomy for bladder cancer.
abstract: Accurate prediction is essential for patient counselling, appropriate selection of treatments and determination of eligibility for clinical trials. In this review we assess the available determinants of oncological outcome after radical cystectomy (RC) for transitional cell carcinoma of the urinary bladder. We reviewed previous publications to provide guidelines in terms of criteria, limitations and clinical value of available tools for predicting patient outcome after RC. Our findings suggest that while individual surgical, patient and pathological features provide useful estimates of survival outcome, the inherent heterogeneity of tumour biology and patient characteristics leads to significant variation in outcome. By incorporating all relevant continuous predictive factors for individual patients, integrative predictive models, such as nomograms or artificial neural networks, provide more accurate predictions and generally surpass clinical experts at predicting outcomes. Nonetheless, there is a clear need for the development and validation of molecular biomarkers and their incorporation into multivariable predictive tools. Significant progress has been made in identifying important molecular markers of disease and the development of multifactorial tools for predicting the outcome after RC.
authors.affiliation: Department of Urology, The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX 77030, USA. vmargu@hotmail.com
authors.forename: Vitaly
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Margulis
authors.forename: Yair
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Lotan
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Montorsi
authors.forename: Shahrokh F
authors.initials: SF
authors.lastname: Shariat
mesh_terms: D002295:Carcinoma, Transitional Cell / Q000401:mortality* / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery; D015653:Cystectomy / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011379:Prognosis; D012307:Risk Factors; D016019:Survival Analysis; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D001749:Urinary Bladder Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality* / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery