Annual Retreat 2023

IBCG RETREAT 2023
The annual International Bladder Cancer Group Retreat was held in Houston, Texas from August 25-26,
2023. The meeting was co-chaired by Drs. Shilpa Gupta, Roger Li and Patrick Hensley and convened 60
international bladder cancer clinicians, scientists, and patient advocates, including IBCG representation
from 10 countries. This year’s keynote speaker was Ms. Toby Shor, a bladder cancer survivor and
philanthropist, who remarked on her personal journey from diagnosis through treatment.
The 2023 Retreat mission was to generate consensus statements on two disease processes and employed
a system of literature review and expert opinion-based recommendation statements with pre-meeting
voting from IBCG membership. Recommendations were revised based on discussion, and final statements
underwent live voting at the conclusion of the meeting, with ratification of statements achieving consensus.
Publication of these proceedings are forthcoming.
In the first session, titled “BCG Unresponsive Disease: Recommendations for Optimal Sequencing & Patient
Selection for Agents”, the group defined existing and emerging therapeutic strategies for BCG unresponsive
nonmuscle-invasive bladder cancer. The adoption of the BCG unresponsive definition by the IBCG and FDA
has been instrumental in patient risk-stratification, insightful interpretation of retrospective clinical
outcomes, and stimulating the development and evaluation of novel bladder-preserving therapies through
clinical trials. The following topics were discussed:
Chemotherapy-Based Treatments
Immunotherapy/Checkpoint Inhibitors
Gene Therapy-Based Agents
Immunotherapy-Based Agents
Targeted & Miscellaneous Treatments
Biomarkers for BCG Unresponsive NMIBC
Defining the “Window of Safety”
Do We Have an “Optimal Agent” for Each Subset of Patients?
The second session was titled “Bladder Conservation in MIBC: Selecting the Right Patient for Trimodality
Therapy, Partial Cystectomy, and Observation post NAC/IO”. Given the lack of direct clinical trial
comparison between bladder preservation techniques and radical cystectomy, limitations in
contemporary clinical staging, and lack of comparative effectiveness data supporting the use of specific
systemic therapy agents and radiation techniques, real-world utilization of bladder conservation has been
limited. However, due emphasis is being placed on alternatives to the one-size-fits-all approach to
neoadjuvant therapy followed by radical cystectomy. The following topics were discussed:
Trimodality Therapy
Partial Cystectomy
Radical Transurethral Resection
Bladder Preservation After Clinical CR Post-NAC/IO
Radical Cystectomy (Comparator)
Biomarkers for Bladder Sparing Therapy in MIBC
The IBCG leadership is currently finalizing topics for next year’s meeting, to be held on August 22- 24, 2024
in Houston, Texas.