The long-term survival for a man diagnosed with testicular cancer is excellent – about 95 percent – thanks to good treatment, including chemotherapy and retroperitoneal lymph node dissections. “However, the disease is relatively rare,” says Phillip Pierorazio, M.D., Director of the Brady’s Division of Testicular Cancer, “with only about 9,000 men diagnosed with it in the U.S. every year. Many urologists may go for years without treating a single patient with testicular cancer, and there has been little guidance on treating testicular cancer for the average urologist.”

That’s no longer the case. In May, the American Urological Association (AUA) released its first-ever guidelines for the management of early-stage testicular cancer. The AUA Guidelines include 45 statements to direct the diagnosis and management of men with early-stage testicular cancer – and each of those statements is supported by evidence from the Evidence-based Practice Center (EPC) at Johns Hopkins, led by Eric Bass, M.D., M.P.H. The EPC team – made up of Bass, Pierorazio, and Brady residents and fellows – evaluated hundreds of medical manuscripts about testicular cancer and generated five reports, on topics including the proper diagnostic and staging tests for testicular cancer patients, the comparative effectiveness of surveillance, chemotherapy, radiation and surgery, surveillance after therapy, and survivorship for men with early forms of the disease.

“This was a much-needed guideline for the standardization of testicular cancer care in the U.S. and around the world,” says Pierorazio. “We are confident this will translate into improved care and outcomes for testicular cancer patients everywhere.”