The paper refers to thirteen patients with epithelial tumours of the upper urinary tract, diagnosed and treated at our unit during the last five years and emphasizes the need of early diagnosis, custumorized therapy and close follow-up. Evolution is clearly more favourable in well differentiated and low stage tumours, regardless the type of surgery performed, versus the poor results obtained in infiltrative and undifferentiated cases for which there is no effective treatment available. Results are analyzed based on a brief literature review and considering the short number of cases contributed.