Freezing Kidney Tumors Recommended as New "Gold Standard" of Treatment

A new study has shown that using interventional cryoablation to destroy kidney tumors is almost 100% effective in destroying localized tumors less than four centimeters in size, and recommends cryoablation as a new "gold standard" of treatment.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, MD, USA) looked at 90 tumors in 84 patients to examine the efficacy--the ratio of how many patients' renal cell carcinoma was destroyed completely for localized tumors by size of cryoablation--of the procedure based on the tumor's size at 3-, 6-, and 12-month clinic visits and then yearly, with follow-up imaging with computerized tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. In addition, the researchers examined cryoablation's safety by studying the results of 101 percutaneous cryoablations on 91 patients who either could not undergo surgery or elected the interventional radiology treatment. The researchers found that cryoablation's efficacy rate was 100% in tumors up to four centimeters in size, and nearly 100% in tumors up to seven centimeters in size. Three localized 10-centimeter tumors --large tumors that are typically removed surgically --were treated; in two of these cases the tumor was successfully killed. The study was presented at the 34th annual scientific meeting of the Society of Interventional Radiology (SIR), held during March 2009 in Las Vegas (NV, USA).

"Interventional cryoablation is as effective as laparoscopic partial nephrectomy, the current gold standard treatment, and laparoscopic cryoablation surgery for treating renal cell carcinoma," said study presenter interventional radiologist Christos Georgiades, M.D., Ph.D. "We can eliminate a cancer -- that once it metastasizes can be notoriously difficult to treat and has a low chance of cure -- with a simple outpatient procedure. Eliminating cancer at such an early stage is truly significant news for kidney cancer patients."

Kidney cancer is the eighth most common cancer in men and the tenth in women; the most common type of kidney cancer is renal cell carcinoma, which forms in the lining of the renal tubules in the kidney that filter the blood and produce urine; approximately 85% percent of kidney tumors are renal cell carcinomas. Typically, those with kidney cancer are past the age of 40 and are twice as likely to be men. Other risk factors include smoking, obesity, high blood pressure, long-term dialysis, and Von Hippel-Lindau syndrome.

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