Steve Goodison, Ph.D.
Two University of Florida researchers at Shands Jacksonville are looking for clues about smoking’s effects on bladder cancer, thanks to a James and Esther King Biomedical Research Program grant awarded them by the Florida Department of Health.
Charles Rosser, M.D., a UF assistant professor of urology, and Steve Goodison, Ph.D., an associate professor and director of research in the UF Department of Pathology, are among 16 recipients selected for the 2005 statewide awards. They will receive $446,719 over three years for their research.
“The grant is looking at diseases that could be tobacco-related, so from a urologic oncologist’s standpoint the most frequent tobacco-related disease I see is bladder cancer,” Rosser said.
Indeed, in the United States smoking is the No. 1 cause for bladder cancer and bladder cancer is the third leading tobacco-related disease – after lung cancer and heart disease.
Bladder cancer is a predominately male disease, with women accounting for only 20 percent of diagnosed cases, according to Rosser, who said that may not hold true for smoking-related cases.
“It’s also probably a little more prevalent in Caucasians than in African Americans, and we don’t really know why,” he said.
“The general public knows how smoking can affect the lungs and the heart but probably knows little about its effects on the bladder,” he added. “But the same toxins produced by smoking that hurt the lung and the heart get into the bloodstream, are excreted into the urine and then sit in the bladder, sometimes for extended periods of time.”
Goodison says men are probably more prone to have obstructive voiding systems. “This means they cannot empty their bladder completely, so these toxins are there,” he explained, “and they’re bathing the lining of the bladder.”
The bladder normally sheds some cells from the wall of the bladder into the urine as part of the natural turnover of the tissue.
“DNA is still in the cells, so we’re going to look at the DNA in those shed cells present in the non-invasively obtained urine and see if there are any genetic abnormalities or changes,” Rosser said.
Then the researchers will conduct genetic tests and correlate it back to the patient’s clinical status.
“We will correlate all the clinical information – including history of smoking – with what we get from the urine sample,” Goodison said. “The long-term clinical outcome of the patients is another piece of the puzzle that will also be correlated with the genetic profile.”
The study might also identify a genetic predisposition to the disease, perhaps related to a less-sufficient clearance of the toxins.
According to Goodison, urine samples are obtained non-invasively and offer a very accessible sample to do molecular biology analysis on.
“This means that bladder biomarkers could really help clinically because you could easily screen both asymptomatic people and people with bladder cancer to look for recurrence,” he said. “It’s an area where you can really do some good and in a tangible time frame.”
What Rosser and Goodison hope to find is a genetic profile associated with the onset of bladder cancer or a genetic predisposition to the disease that can be used for screening, followed by earlier detection and intervention.
Similar studies have been done, with the largest collecting 40 samples, said Goodison.
“Other studies may come out in the meantime, but ours will be the biggest to date if it goes to plan,” he said. “If we understand the genetics of the tumor, we can gain valuable insight into tumor biology and start to understand the molecular basis of tumor progression. This, in turn, could open up other avenues of basic research.”