ABSTRACT

Non-muscle invasive bladder cancer includes a group of urothelial cancers having heterogeneous characteristics. As a rule, they show recurrence and progression. The principle of surveillance and management of these tumors is decreasing recurrence rate and preventing progression. Based on this principle, surveillance policy is created according to clinical and pathological characteristics of tumors. While appropriate management is going on, over-followup in low risk group and less frequent followup in high risk group should not be done. Cystoscopy and urinary cytology are worldwide accepted diagnostic tools. Recently, since psychological effect and high economic burden on patients, the approach of reducing frequency and duration of followup cystoscopies in patients with low risk has been popularized in developing followup schedules. In this text, the fundamentals of this approach is reviewed.