Are There Symptoms?

Transcript

As far as symptoms go, there’s two main categories of symptoms that typically occur if a patient has cancer of the ureter.

The first is that the cancer at some point, for no reason, starts to bleed. You experience that as blood in the urine.

The second way is simple plumbing. If cancer of the ureter grows enough to block off the ureter tube that’s carrying urine between the kidney and the bladder, it blocks off the plumbing. Kidney might not be able to exit that kidney and the kidney begins to swell. That’s experienced as severe pain in the flank or in the back. It might just start as a nagging ache.

So those are the two broad categories. Blood in the urine or pain from blockage. I should point out that although many patients with cancer of the ureter initially come to their attention because of blood in the urine, if you just have blood in the urine, it certainly doesn’t mean that you have cancer of the ureter. In fact, most patients with blood in the urine are not ultimately found to have cancer.

Key Takeaways

1. One symptom of ureteral cancer is blood in the urine.

2. If cancer grows enough to block off the ureter tube that’s carrying urine between the kidney and the bladder, the kidney might begin to swell.

3. This is experienced as severe pain in the flank or in the back and might just start as a nagging ache.

4. However, most patients with blood in the urine are not ultimately found to have cancer.