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Effective long-term treatment for kidney tumors
Source: (cancerfacts.com)
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
BOSTON – June 22, 2005 – Zapping small kidney tumors with high-frequency radio waves is a reasonable, long-term treatment for the most common type of kidney cancer say researchers.
Led by Dr. W. Scott McDougal, chief of urology at Massachusetts General Hospital, the research team shows in a follow-up to research published in 2003, that the treatment, called radiofrequency ablation, continued to be successful 4 to 6 years after administration. Radiofrequency ablation is a minimally invasive method of destroying tissue by directing a special needle into a tumor and then transmitting high-energy radio waves through the needle. The report appears in the July issue of the Journal of Urology.
"This study shows, for the first time, that this is a very effective long-term treatment for small kidney tumors in selected patients," McDougal said in a news release. "Right now, older patients with small lesions in limited areas of their kidneys are good candidates for this procedure. We need to wait for 10-year follow-up information to determine whether it will be appropriate for patients with a longer life expectancy."
Among 16 patients reported on in this 4-year follow-up study, five patients whose treatment was initially successful died from causes unrelated to kidney cancer. Of the 11 remaining patients, none had any recurrence or cancer spread 4 to 6 years after treatment.
Overall, treatments of all tumors on the kidney surface were successful, as were the treatments of tumors deep within the kidney, which sometimes require additional treatments. Two patients had what are called mixed tumors, and only one of them was treated successfully. Although treatment of the other mixed-tumor patient did not reduce the size of the lesion, that patient died of an unrelated brain tumor a year after treatment.
Placement of the radiofrequency probe is guided by CT scan, ultrasound or other imaging techniques. Radiofrequency ablation is widely used to treat heart disorders, and is also being investigated for destruction of small liver tumors and has been used for more than ten years to treat a benign bone tumor called osteoid osteoma.
For more than six years researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital have been using RFA to treat kidney tumors in patients for whom surgical removal was not an option because of other health concerns. For the current study, the research team reviewed information on 16 of the first patients treated with the technique; three patients had multiple tumors, making a total of 20 tumors treated.
McDougal adds that the research team now has used the methods to treat a total of 100 renal cell carcinomas in 85 patients with similar results – successful tumor destruction in 100 percent of surface tumors and 78 percent of central tumors.
Renal cell carcinoma will be diagnosed in almost 32,000 Americans this year and is most frequently treated with surgical removal through either an open or laparoscopic procedure.
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