What is the connection between catheters and bladder cancer?
There is a strong association between chronic, long-term catheterization, as seen in quadriplegics or paraplegics, and the subsequent development of bladder cancer. The type of bladder cancer that chronic inflammation and irritation (such as is associated with catheters or bladder stones) leads to is called squamous cell carcinoma. It's a little different than the common variety or the more common variety of transitional cell carcinoma. Interestingly, inflammation and chronic infection with parasites in other parts of the world, notably the Nile Valley in Egypt, North Africa, leads to parasitic infestation and inflammation of the bladder called Schistosomiasis, and this very frequently leads to bladder cancer. Again, it's the squamous cell variant, which is mostly coming out of Egypt and North Africa. Somewhere between 30% and 50% of patients who have squamous cell carcinoma in that part of the world, when the tumor is studied, is found to contain various strains of HPV virus, human papillomavirus, which in this country has been clearly associated with cervical cancer in women. There may be a viral component that we don't understand, that we don't see in this part of the world. Again, it raises the question of the role of chronic irritation and inflammation.
