ORLANDO, FL (UroToday) - Are we leaving cancer behind?

Testis-sparing surgery is gaining momentum for treatment of small/localized testicular tumors.

Ehrlich and colleagues identified 145 patients who underwent orchiectomy for germ cell tumor. The investigators re-reviewed the pathologic specimens from these patients and evaluated whether any satellite tumor sites were present in addition to the primary mass. These investigators found that 33% of patient had concomitant microscopic tumors in the orchiectomy specimen! These tumors fell into one of four categories: (1) discrete tumor foci spatially unrelated (median distance 4 mm) to the primary mass - 12% (2) single or a small group of malignant germ cells within normal testicular parenchymal tissues - 14% (3) tumor deposits in the lymphovascular channels within otherwise normal parenchyma- 12% (4) pagetoid tumor spread to rete testis - 1.4%.

Presence of satellite tumor sites was more likely if the patient's tumor was small (p