Radiation?

Hi--

My mom (67yrs old) has Stage 3 RCC (T3, N1, MX). She had 1 kidney removed on Feb 3rd. Her recovery from surgery has been amazing--the doctors can't believe how quickly she has bounced back. The Doctors say that they can't see any more cancer in her (it was a big tumor on the kidney and the vien to the stomach--they say they cleaned it all out). They did find a cell in 1 lymph node in the kidney area.

I'm hoping to get some advise/information on radiation therapy. He radiologist explained it to her and there seem to be some risks associated with taking the therapy--it would be localized therapy, just the area where the cancer was--but it could damage her remaining kidney, damage her bowls, set back her recovery, etc. If the doctors say there is no cancer in her now, do the benefits of radiation outweigh the risks?

RCC is notoriously resistant to conventional radiation therapy. If all her cancer has been removed by surgery, I do not believe that she will benefit from radiation to the kidney bed to prevent possible recurrence. As the radiologist said, there are serious side effects to radiation, both short and long term, and because RCC is resistant to radiation, your mother will be incurring these risks without likely benefit.

Hi--

Thanks for the reply. I appreciate the willingness to share your knowledge (I'm so new to this!). After some more research this is how I feel too. The radiologist HAS recommended it but we are not moving forward with it. Thanks again!

There is an email support group specific to kidney cancer. Join it at http://cancerguide.org/kofaq/ .

i had an upper ultrasound g.i. the dr told me he could do radation but i could bleed to death and he wouldn't do surgery. he wouldn't touch me. the dr (radiologist)here in my home town told he thought he could do radiation and heal the cancer tumer away from my duodom but on the concent form he put could bleed to death, i was exteremly upset after talking to a nurse and friends radiaton had poor results on RCC. iturned him down on all radiation treatments its nice to see the above message
god bless