An expert from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas emphasized that stereotactic radiation provides oncologists with an alternative modality for treating patients with kidney cancer for whom standard ablative surgery is not an option.
Community urologists should consider stereotactic radiation therapy as another clinically useful tool for treating patients with kidney cancer, according to Raquibul Hannan, MD, PhD, a professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology, Urology and Immunology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.
During the 2022 Society for Urologic Oncology (SUO) Annual Meeting, CancerNetwork® spoke with Hannan regarding his presentation on the use of stereotactic radiation for managing metastatic kidney cancer.
Hannan suggests that stereotactic radiation therapy would be beneficial in cases where patients with metastatic kidney cancer are ineligible or unsuitable for receiving treatment with ablation or surgery.
“For all of those patients, [community urologists] should keep in mind that stereotactic radiation is there,” he said.
Transcript:
The community urologists should really take [stereotactic radiation] as another modality, another arsenal at their disposal to help their patients. Some patients are definitely not candidates [for surgery]. Some patients have bigger tumors that are not applicable for treatment with ablation. Some patients are just too frail to go through surgery, or they may have only a single kidney that [for which] nephrectomy is not possible. For all of those patients, they should keep in mind that stereotactic radiation is there. That offers more than 90% local control, and it is something that they can offer to their patients.