A symposium on benign prostatic hyperplasia is appropriate at a time when new knowledge and new technology are rapidly emerging. As the age of the population has increased and diagnostic methods have improved, the incidence of diseases of the prostate has increased. Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) is the most common benign tumor in men and results in urinary symptoms in the majority of men older than 50 years; furthermore it has in the past necessitated operative intervention in 20%-30% of men who live to the age of 80 years. The relief of obstruction resulting from this benign neoplasm by...

In the United States in 1997, 28800 new cases of malignant tumors of the kidney and renal pelvis were diagnosed along with 2100 new cases of malignant tumors of the ureter and other urinary organs, 7200 primary malignant tumors of the testis, and 1300 primary malignant tumors of the penis and other genital organs. In large measure, surgery is the treatment of choice for these tumors, but radiation therapy is in creasingly recognized as having significant and important curative and palliative bene fits in each of these tumor sites. Surgery is the standard form of treatment for non metastatic...

The American Cancer Society anticipates that during 1995, 244000 new cases of cancer of the prostate will have been diagnosed in the United States, with 40400 deaths from the disease process. The rapid increase in the actual number of new cases in the United States is directly related to more regularized digital rectal examinations and the more frequent and widespread use of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) screening programs. As a conse quence, major controversies have emerged in how best to manage the patient with cancer of the prostate. These include the necessity of PSA screening programs,...

Bladder cancer represents a major challenge to the oncologist. In spite of new tech niques for early diagnosis and innovative imaging procedures for staging, the outcome in terms of cure has not improved during the past ten years. Fortunately, about 74% of the patients present with localized disease, with 18% presenting with localized and regional disease, and 3% with distant metastases at diagnosis. In accordance with the stage at presentation, 94% of patients with localized disease are controlled at 5 years, as are 50% of patients with local and regional disease but un fortunately only 7%...