Kidney Lesions
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Nonsurgical ablative approaches to Renal Cell Carcinoma
For a variety of reasons, such as advanced age or poor overall health, patients with RCC may also be treated without surgery. Other locally ablative approaches including radiofrequency ablation (RFA) (inserting probes and heating the tumor) and cryosurgery (inserting probes and freezing the tumor) have been applied against localized RCC lesions with short term success, achieving complete tumor cell death in a high percentage of patients, though confirmation of long-term effectiveness with these approaches appears to be lacking (7-11). Although RFA and cryosurgery procedures are considered less invasive than classic resective surgery, significant complications may occur, including major bleeding, ureteral obstruction, urinary leak, bowel injury, abscess, nerve injury, skin burn and pancreatic injury (7,8,10,11).
In summary, though apparently effective in the short to intermediate term, the long term efficacy of non-surgical RCC ablation by radiofrequency heating or cryosurgery, relative to surgical removal, remains undefined. Though a major operation is avoided with these approaches, serious complications may still occur.
Normal Kidney
Written by Donald B. Fuller, M.D. – Radiation Oncologist