Reply to the letter from Drs Schouten and Kiemeney
1993
Response to Concerns About Bladder Cancer Rate Comparability
Editorial
Author Information
Author(s): Janine Bell, Heather Bourne
Primary Institution: The Thames Cancer Registry
Conclusion
The Thames Cancer Registry maintains consistent coding practices for bladder cancer, allowing for interpretable incidence trends despite some differences in terminology used by pathologists.
Supporting Evidence
- The Thames Cancer Registry assigns behaviour codes to tumours carefully.
- Only two cases of papillary transitional carcinoma in situ were reported in five years.
- Coding practices for bladder cancer have remained unchanged for over 20 years.
Takeaway
This letter explains that the way bladder cancer is classified hasn't changed much over the years, so the trends we see in cancer rates are reliable.
Limitations
The study's findings are limited by the unavailability of case-notes from 8-10 years after diagnosis.
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