In recent years, the incidence of bladder cancer is rapidly increasing in both men and women. The reason why bladder cancer has received less attention is that it has a strange “temperament”. It is a malignant tumor that is “introverted, hidden and deep”. It does not like to show itself, always “clenched tail” quietly eroding the human bladder. Occasionally, a little bit of tail inadvertently revealed, it hurried to collect up. Today, let’s learn more about the relationship between hematuria and bladder cancer.
How to detect bladder cancer as early as possible?
Many people often think that hematuria is not painful or abnormal, so there is no serious health problem. In fact, this is a wrong idea. Painless hematuria is often a sign of malignant tumor – bladder cancer.
Ignoring painless hematuria can delay the disease Hematuria is not a disease, but a precursor of many diseases. Most commonly, hematuria is caused by urinary stones or urinary tract infections. Other urinary tract diseases such as bladder cancer or kidney cancer can also cause hematuria. Hematuria caused by stones and urinary tract infections is often taken seriously by patients because of the pain and frequent urination, and they will seek medical attention in time. However, hematuria caused by bladder cancer is usually not painful, and the frequency of hematuria in early stage is very low, often only once in a few months, so it is easily ignored by many people.
However, in fact, hematuria is a unique abnormal urination signal of bladder cancer. Compared with hematuria caused by other diseases, hematuria in bladder cancer has two characteristics: 1. It is painless. In other words, when hematuria occurs, the patient has no pain or other uncomfortable symptoms until the cancer necrosis, ulceration and combined infection, then the patient will have bladder irritation symptoms such as urinary frequency, urinary urgency and pain.
2. Secondly, it is intermittent. That is, hematuria appears intermittently and can be stopped or reduced by itself. Two episodes of hematuria can be separated by days or months, or even six months. This feature can easily make patients have the illusion that hematuria has improved on its own, thus missing out on timely diagnosis and treatment.
In this regard, we remind everyone: “As long as there is hematuria, regardless of whether the amount is large or small, even if it is not painful and only happens once in a long time, you should be highly alert and go to a major hospital specialist for an early examination. Because according to clinical data, it is found that 10% to 20% of painless hematuria is related to malignant tumors. If it is ignored, the condition will be delayed, the best time for treatment will be missed, and lives will be endangered.”
Early diagnosis and early treatment If hematuria occurs, experts say that, first, a urinary ultrasound can be done to look at the kidneys, ureters and bladder. If an occupying lesion is found, the whole bladder can be further observed with cystoscopy, which can directly see the size, location and number of the tumor, and also clamp a bit of tissue cells for pathological examination, which can further clarify the nature of the tumor. Cystoscopy is the only means to confirm the diagnosis of bladder cancer before surgery.
Currently, transurethral resection of bladder tumor is the mainstream treatment method for bladder cancer in clinical practice.
However, within 2 years after surgery, about 50% of bladder cancer patients will recur; therefore, experts remind that post-surgical bladder cancer patients also need follow-up treatment – bladder infusion chemotherapy drugs and regular cystoscopy review. Intravesical infusion chemotherapy is an important tool to prevent tumor recurrence, which can kill the residual tumor tissue in the bladder. For patients with high-risk bladder tumors, intravesical BCG infusion is more likely to enhance systemic immunity and prevent tumor progression to muscle infiltration. In addition, regular postoperative cystoscopic review is indispensable. Currently, electronic fiberoptic cystoscopy has fully replaced the traditional rigid cystoscopy, which is less invasive and almost painless for patients.
Keep away from risk factors The occurrence of bladder cancer has both intrinsic genetic factors and external environmental factors. Currently, two of the more obvious risk factors are smoking and long-term exposure to industrial chemicals.
Smoking is the most certain risk factor for bladder cancer, about 30% to 50% of bladder cancer is caused by smoking, and smoking can increase the risk rate of bladder cancer by 2 to 4 times.
Another important risk factor for bladder cancer is long-term exposure to industrial chemical products. About 20% of bladder cancers are caused by occupational factors, including those involved in textiles, dye manufacturing, rubber chemistry, pharmaceutical and pesticide production, paint, leather, and aluminum and steel production.
Conclusion: Therefore, in order to reduce the occurrence of bladder cancer, it is recommended that smokers quit smoking as early as possible, while men over 45 years old should preferably have urinary routine and urological ultrasound during their annual physical examination to screen for tumors in the urinary tract.