Adherence to Surveillance Among Patients With Superficial Bladder Cancer

Background: Patients diagnosed with superficial bladder cancer who have not undergone total cystectomy are at high risk for recurrence, and bladder surveillance with cystos-copy is recommended for such patients every 3–6 months. We examined the degree to which bladder cancer patients undergo the recommended surveillance procedures and identified patient and primary care provider characteristics associated with nonadherence to these recommendations. Methods: We used information obtained from the Surveil-lance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program– Medicare-linked database to identify 6717 patients aged 65 years or older who were diagnosed with superficial bladder cancer from 1992 through 1996 and who survived for at least 3 years after diagnosis but did not have a total cystectomy. We used information obtained from Medicare claims form