That's tough news to hear... I'm really sorry to hear that but at least they have identified the problem area now.
I was found to have a 1.6 cm "bladder mass" January 2010 and my uro removed it via a TURBT. He was surprised by my diagnosis when the path came back that it was an invasive adenocarcinoma (rare category) and the pathologist said it was suspicious for invasion into the muscle layer but they could not confirm it with the sample. At that point, it was beyond his area of expertise.
He sent me to Vanderbilt where the uro/surgeon was fortunately able to just remove a segment of the bladder wall (partial cystectomy) at the tumor site just in case there was still tumor cells there. When that path report came back, a very small portion of the tumor had been left behind-- about .5cm, but two margins around that were clear.
So it seems sometimes the TURBT instrument cannot go deep enough to get everything. Like others have said, it's time to seek out an experienced specialist.
Best wishes... Catherine
Forum Moderator Team
TURBT 1/21/10 at age 55
Dx: T2aN0M0 Primary Bladder Adenocarcinoma
Partial Cystectomy 2/25/10
Vanderbilt Medical Center
Nashville, TN