Patent ID: 7666586

Claim:
A method of classifying the disease course of a human bladder cancer tissue, comprising collecting a sample comprising cells from the cancer tissue, assaying the expression of at least one Ta stage gene from a Ta stage gene group, wherein said Ta gene is characterized by being up-regulated in Ta stage tissue compared to T2 stage tissue, and assaying at least one T2 stage gene from a T2 stage gene group, wherein said T2 gene is characterized by being up-regulated in T2 stage tissue compared to Ta stage tissue, wherein said Ta stage gene is SEQ ID NO: 1 and wherein said T2 stage gene is SEQ ID NO: 2, (i) correlating the expression level of the assessed Ta stage gene to a standard level of the Ta gene expression level in T2 stage tissue and (ii) correlating the expression level of the assessed T2 stage gene to a standard level of the T2 gene expression level in Ta stage tissue, wherein up-regulation of the expression level of said Ta stage gene and down-regulation of said T2 stage gene classifies said bladder cancer disease course as non-muscle invasive and wherein up-regulation of the expression level of said T2 stage gene and down-regulation of said Ta stage gene classifies said bladder cancer disease course as muscle invasive.