Renal cancer

About 1000 patients are diagnosed with renal cancer in Sweden each year, constituting 2% of all diagnosed cancers in Sweden. For those patients with a small tumor which is completely removed during surgery, the 5-year survival is close to 95% although for patients with metastasizing cancer, the 5-year survival is below 10%. Even though the tumor has been fully removed during surgery, 25% of the patients have a relapse.

Renal cancer is divided into several subgroups such as clear cell renal cancer and chromophobe renal cancer, and each subgroup have a different prognosis. In order to predict an individual patient’s prognosis and to suggest a treatment (for metastasizing cancer) several factors are used such as subgroup of cancer, size of the tumor and blood markers. These values can give the doctor some guidance regarding prognosis and treatment options, although the information provided is not enough and there is a need for better tools. If such tools existed, the doctor would have a better chance to give the patient the right treatment but also avoid giving treatments to those patients that would not benefit from it and who would also likely suffer from side effects from the treatment.

The aim with the research on renal cancer within the Urological cancer research environment is to find more information about the features of different subgroups of renal cancer, which could lead to more individualized treatments for patients with the disease.