Kidney Cancer Grows Silently: These 3 Habits Significantly Increase Your Risk

Kidney cancer often develops asymptomatically and is detected too late.
Smoking, obesity and high blood pressure significantly increase the risk of developing the disease.
Experts warn that even one of these factors can influence the development of the disease.
Early prevention and a healthy lifestyle can significantly reduce the risk

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A million people die every year. The ministry has set up a 20-person team to fight the disease.

It often develops secretly, asymptomatically, which significantly complicates its detection - reminded specialists in the field of oncology, urology and radiotherapy associated with the Polish Kidney Cancer Group in a press release sent to PAP.

According to statistics , approximately 5,000 people in Poland are diagnosed with kidney cancer each year . In the same time, half of the patients with this cancer die.

It occurs most often in men over the age of 45 and in women between the ages of 55 and 74. The dominant form of the disease is renal cell carcinoma (RCC), which accounts for 90 percent of cases.

Although kidney cancer most often occurs in older people, smokers, obese people and people with high blood pressure , it can also occur in younger people who take care of their health.

In its early stages, this cancer is often asymptomatic. That is why it is so important to have regular check-ups, such as abdominal ultrasound, especially in people over 50. This increases the chances of detecting a kidney tumour earlier, and therefore of effective treatment, experts noted.

The classic set of symptoms such as hematuria, flank pain and a palpable mass usually appears in advanced disease .

As the cancer spreads, it can invade other organs, such as the lungs, bones, brain, or adrenal glands. Data suggests that nearly 30 percent of patients have symptomatic metastases at the time of diagnosis .

In the case of kidney cancer limited to the organ or with only slight spread, the basic method of treatment remains surgery, which involves the removal of the primary tumor and any possible, few metastases, experts reminded.

In more advanced stages of the disease - especially when there are numerous metastases - surgical treatment does not bring the expected results. In such cases, pharmacotherapy plays a key role, which consists of the use of immunotherapy as the only method of treatment or immunotherapy in combination with molecularly targeted drugs. They are available to Polish patients under the B.10 drug program.

- Several effective immunotherapy regimens are available for the treatment of advanced kidney cancer, such as nivolumab in combination with ipilimumab, lenvatinib with pembrolizumab, or cabozantinib with nivolumab. In selected cases, it is worth considering the use of immunotherapy after its previous use, in combination with local treatment, e.g. radiotherapy or surgery - said a specialist in urology and clinical oncology, president of the Polish Kidney Cancer Group, Dr. Jakub Żołnierek.

Intensive treatment not only gives a chance to control the disease, but also has a confirmed significant impact on extending the survival time of patients. For example, clinical trials have shown that the benefits of combination therapy with nivolumab and ipilimumab (CheckMate-214 study) or cabozantinib and nivolumab (ChekMat 9ER study) persist even after several years of observation. This makes them one of the most important achievements in the treatment of advanced kidney cancer, experts assessed.

- Polish patients with kidney cancer have access to a wide range of modern treatment methods, including molecularly targeted therapies and immunotherapy. However, even successful treatment does not mean the end of the struggle with the disease - noted Dr. Żołnierek.

He added that patients require regular check-ups - for the first three years, imaging tests need to be performed every few months, and for the next two years - once a year.

- Such a scheme allows for early detection of a possible relapse and rapid implementation of re-treatment. This fact shows that this disease is extremely insidious, which is why it is so important for patients and their loved ones to have access to verified, reliable information that can be a real support in making informed health decisions - the specialist summed up.