Nuclear Matrix Protein 22 in Voided Urine Cytology Efficacy in Risk Stratification for Carcinoma of Bladder

Performance characteristics of urinary cytology in patients presenting with gross and microscopic hematuria

PURPOSE

Hematuria investigations presently entail cystoscopy with upper urinary tract imaging albeit without use of urinary biomarkers including cytology. The purpose is to investigate the performance characteristics of urinary cytology in a population of patients presenting with gross (GH) and microscopic (MH) hematuria.

METHODS

Records for 409 consecutive patients undergoing a complete hematuria evaluation (cystoscopy with upper-tract imaging) who also had urinary cytology were reviewed. Performance characteristics (sensitivity, specificity, PPV, NPV) of cytology for urothelial malignancy were determined. For those with urothelial cancer, the predictive value of a positive cytology for high grade and high stage urothelial cancer was determined.

RESULTS

29 of 409 patients (7.1%) were diagnosed with urothelial carcinoma including 24 (9.2%) and 5 (3.4%) from the GH and MH populations, respectively. Eighteen (62%) of these tumors were high grade of which 5 (28%) were muscle-invasive. The performance characteristics of cytology for urothelial malignancy included a sensitivity of 41%, specificity of 99%, PPV of 75%, NPV of 96%, and diagnostic accuracy of 95%. No observed differences were noted when comparing gender (P=0.55), type of hematuria (P=0.37), or smoking history (P=0.22). For those diagnosed with urothelial malignancy, a positive cytology was not associated with higher grade (P=1.0) or stage tumors (P=0.62).

CONCLUSIONS

Urine cytology had low sensitivity and PPV for urothelial carcinoma irrespective of smoker status, hematuria type, or gender. These data support the 2020 AUA Microhematuria Guideline emphasizing that urine cytology should not routinely be used in a hematuria screening population.

Comparison of the clinical usefulness of different urinary tests for the initial detection of bladder cancer: a systematic review

Objectives:

The standard initial approach in patients with hematuria or other symptoms suggestive of bladder cancer (BC) is a combination of cystoscopy and urine cytology (UC); however, UC has low sensitivity particularly in low-grade tumors. The aim of the present review was to critically analyze and compare results in the literature of promising molecular urinary tests for the initial diagnosis of BC.

Methods:

We searched in the Medline and Cochrane Library databases for literature from January 2009 to January 2019, following the PRISMAguidelines.

Results:

In terms of sensitivity, ImmunoCyt showed the highest mean and median value, higher than UC. All tests analyses showed higher mean and median sensitivity when compared with UC. In terms of specificity, only UroVysion and Microsatellite analyses showed mean and median values similar to those of UC, whereas for all other tests, the specificity was lower than UC. It is evident that the sensitivity of UC is particularly low in low grade BC. Urinary tests mainly had improved sensitivity when compared to UC, and ImmunoCyt and UroVysion had the highest improvement in low grade tumors.

Conclusions:

Most of the proposed molecular markers were able to improve the sensitivity with similar or lower specificity when compared to UC. However, variability of results among the different studies was strong. Thus, as of now, none of these markers presented evidences so as to be accepted by international guidelines for diagnosis of BC.

An ensemble approach of urine sediment image analysis and NMP22 test for detection of bladder cancer cells

Background

Bladder cancer is the eighth most common cancer and the second most common urological cancer in Korean males. Current diagnostic tools for bladder cancer include cystoscopy (an upper tract study), urine cytology, and nuclear matrix protein 22 (NMP22) test. In this study, we evaluated the detection rate of atypical/malignant urothelial cells in urinary sediment images when flagged for positive NMP22 test.

Methods

NMP22 was measured by NMP22 BladderChek Test (Abbott Laboratories) and urine chemical and sediment analysis were performed by fully automated cobas 6500 urine analyzer (Roche Diagnostics). Specimens that met the manual microscopic examination (MME) criteria were then subjected to an on‐screen review of images. We subsequently reviewed sediment images and examined under the microscopy for the flagged cases.

Results

Of the 1217 patients, 345 (28.3%) had positive NMP22 results, whereas 872 (71.7%) had negative results. Out of the positive results, 154 (12.7%) were positive and 191 (15.7%) weakly positive for NMP22. Screened review of flagged specimens (ie, positive NMP22 result) with sediment imaging analysis revealed that suspicious urothelial carcinoma cells were detected in only two cases (0.8%). In the NMP22 negative flagged cases, the suspicious neoplastic cells were not found.

Conclusions

Our findings suggest that the NMP22 test should be added to the flagging criteria for MME to improve diagnostic accuracy. The combination of urine sediment imaging analysis and NMP22 test can significantly assist technicians in the review of specimens.

Use of the Nuclear Matrix Protein 22 BladderChek Test for the Detection of Primary and Recurrent Urothelial Carcinoma

Objective

To evaluate the performance of the nuclear matrix protein 22 (NMP22) BladderChek test in urothelial carcinoma (UC).

Methods

We retrospectively analyzed 1318 patients who performed the NMP22 BladderChek tests. Of them, 103 were primary UC patients, 90 were surgical treatment UC patients, and 1125 were benign disease patients. The performance of the NMP22 BladderChek test for the diagnosis of primary and recurrent UC was evaluated. Moreover, the performance of urine cytology and the NMP22 BladderChek test for the diagnosis of primary UC was compared in 90 available subjects including 48 primary UC patients and 42 benign disease patients.

Results

The sensitivity and specificity of the NMP22 BladderChek test were 37.9% and 95.8%, respectively, for the diagnosis of primary UC (n = 1228). The corresponding parameters of the NMP22 BladderChek test were 31.0% and 88.5%, respectively, for the diagnosis of recurrent UC (n = 90). The sensitivity and specificity of urine cytology were 54.2% and 97.6%, respectively, for the diagnosis of primary UC (n = 90); the corresponding parameters of the NMP22 BladderChek test were 41.7% and 83.3%, respectively; the corresponding parameters of the two tests combination were 64.6% and 83.3%, respectively. There was a significant difference in the performance between the NMP22 BladderChek test and urine cytology or the combination of two tests (P = 0.017 and 0.001, respectively).

Conclusions

The NMP22 BladderChek test has a low sensitivity for detecting primary and recurrent UC. Urine cytology is superior to the NMP22 BladderChek test, and combined use of the two tests improves the sensitivity in the detection of primary UC.