Kidney Cancer prognosis and staging

Dear Ask The Doctor: My father was diagnosed with Kidney Cancer and he is 81 years old. I was wondering how fast does this trype of cancer spread. They wont do suregery due to his age. The cancer growth is the half the size of an apple. How long does it take to reach or spread to blood stream or other organs. He found out that he had cancer through a scan, because he was having terrible stomache and back pain. As much information you can give would be great. Thanks

Dear Alice: Renal cell carcinoma/ kidney cancer is usually a cancer which is asymptomatic and is diagnosed by chance on a ct or ultrasound. Smoking is considered as one of the major risk factors of the same. The treatment usually depends on the staging of the cnacer ie how much has spread to other surrounding tissues or organs. Typically the spread depends upon the size of the primary tumor and usually spreads to the other organs through lymph, venous or direct spread methods. While there is no exact time period of the spread it has been seen that about 30 % of these have already spread to the renal vein at the time of diagnosis after which the spread is usually very quick. You need to ask your doctor about the staging of this cancer in your father and then there are different percentages of prognosis for the same:

The stages are as follows: Stage T1 and T2: tumor is > or < than 7 cm and is confined to the renal parenchyma

Stage T3: tumor extends into major veins and adrenal glands

Stage T4: tumor extends beyod kidney capsule

N: metastasis to lymph nodes. M: metastasis ( spread) to different organs.

Hope this helps.