Bladder cancer biomarker screening based on non-targeted urine metabolomics

Purpose Bladder cancer is one of the most common malignancies of the urinary system, and its screening relies heavily on invasive cystoscopy, which increases the risk of urethral injury and infection. This study aims to use non-targeted metabolomics methods to screen for metabolites that are significantly different between the urine of bladder cancer patients and cancer-free controls. Methods In this study, liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry was used to analyze the urine of bladder cancer patients ( n = 57) and the cancer-free controls ( n = 38) by non-targeted metabolomic analysis and metabolite identification. Results The results showed that there were significant differences in the expression of 27 metabolites between bladder cancer patients and the cancer-free controls. Conclusion In the multivariate statistical analysis of this study, the urinary metabolic profile data of bladder cancer patients were analyzed, and the receiver operating characteristic curve analysis showed that it is possible to perform non-invasive clinical diagnoses of bladder cancer through these candidate biomarkers.