Continuing Education
for Urology & GU Oncology Clinicians

Conference Coverage: SUO 2019 Kidney

Washington, DC (UroToday.com) The therapeutic landscape for metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC) is rapidly evolving with the incorporation of single- and more recently dual-agent targeted therapies, and biomarkers may provide an opportunity to further classify tumors prior to treatment. There are several categories of biomarkers including diagnostic, prognostic, predictive, pharmacodynamic, discovery, and surrogate. Dr. Joshua Lang discusses that predictive markers, or those that categorize patients by their likelihood for response to treatment (e.g. EGFR mutation in NSCLC and sensitivity to erlotinib/gefitinib), pharmacodynamic markers such as tumor dynamics as determined by serial radiographic imaging, and discovery markers, or those that are intended to identify previously unknown alterations that promote tumorigenesis/metastasis/resistance (e.g. genomic analysis for ALK rearrangements), are the most informative in his practice.

Non-Accredited

Washington, DC (UroToday.com) High-volume retroperitoneal surgeon Dr. Viraj Master provided a summary of building a surgical team to tackle these complex operations at the SUO 2019 kidney cancer session. Dr. Master started by highlighting a Canadian population level study assessing predictors of in-hospital mortality with IVC tumor thrombus resection.1 

Non-Accredited

Washington, DC (UroToday.com) Dr. Vitaly Margulis presented on the role of radiation in the management of renal cell carcinoma (RCC). He began his talk by dispelling the widespread belief that RCC is radio-insensitive. While, at conventional lower doses of radiation the cancer cells are immune, with the high doses feasible with Stereotactic Ablative Radiotherapy (SAbR), he demonstrated that RCC is actually very sensitive. SAbR, also referred to as SBRT, has the ability to provide very focused and precise radiation, allowing for high dose delivery with a minimized effect on surrounding tissues. The remainder of his talk focused on the role of radiotherapy in the primary, locally advanced and metastatic settings.

Non-Accredited

Washington, DC (UroToday.com)  Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is one of the most common types of cancer worldwide, with an estimated 75,000 new cases in 2019. RCC treated with curative intent still results in the development of distant or local recurrences within five years in 20–30% of cases.

Non-Accredited

Washington, DC (UroToday.com)  As part of the SUO-CTC clinical trials session, Dr. Gennady Bratslavsky provided an important update on adjuvant trials for renal cell carcinoma (RCC) within the CTC. As we are aware, there have been no clinical trials that have provided an overall survival benefit, with only S-TRAC providing a disease-free survival benefit,1 Currently, there are exciting perioperative trials in RCC, focusing on immunotherapy options:

Non-Accredited