Using the urinary microbiome to predict BCG therapy responses in bladder cancer patients.

Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) immunotherapy is the standard care for patients with non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC). However, up to fifty percent of patients have reoccurrence of tumours or further progression to invasive disease within five years. Randy Sweis, MD, of the University of Chicago Medical Center, Chicago, IL, speaks at the 2019 Genitourinary Cancers Symposium, held in San Francisco, CA, and details how by examining the urine microbiome of patients and specifically biomarkers within the urine microbiome, one can begin to predict responses to the BCG therapy, as well as potentially predicting further immune responses to the treatment and more generally, bladder cancer.