Research

Dr. Kaushal Asrani received a 2024 Kidney Cancer Association Trailblazer Award in partnership with Joey's Wings Foundation for research on "Therapeutic Targeting of EGFR and HER2 in Translocation Renal Cell Carcinoma". Dr. Asrani is a research associate at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. We spoke with him about his research and the impact it could have…

We rounded up a few research highlights from the 2024 ASCO Genitourinary Cancers Symposium (ASCO GU), held recently in San Francisco, California. Adjuvant immunotherapy improved survival after nephrectomy and could be new standard of care Researchers are touting a potential new standard of care following surgery for clear cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC) patients with an intermediate- to high-risk of recurrence who…

This is a guest post by Dr. Arpita Desai, an oncologist at the University of California San Francisco specializing in genitourinary cancers. She summarized the results and takeaways for patients from key trials presented at the recent American Society of Clinical Oncology Genitourinary Cancers Symposium (ASCO GU).  Survival benefit seen for adjuvant pembrolizumab  Over the past five decades, researchers have…

This is a guest post by D'Ann George, PhD, Medical Writer. Joel Stern vividly remembers the first time he saw the phrase palliative care in his medical file. At the time, in 2020, Stern had just been diagnosed with stage IV renal-cell carcinoma. “I thought it was the equivalent of hospice, which I knew wasn’t something I wanted to see…

This is a guest post by Dr. Pavlos Msaouel, a medical oncologist and researcher at MD Anderson Cancer Center, renal medullary carcinoma expert, and member of the KCA’s Medical Steering Committee. Dr. Msaouel has also received multiple KCA grants to further research in kidney cancer. Six papers published in 2023 improved our understanding of renal medullary carcinoma (RMC), a rare…

Dr. Salvatore La Rosa, KCA Chief Scientific Officer I’m excited to highlight a new study spearheaded by Dr. Ritesh Kotecha from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center that describes how renal cell carcinoma (RCC) patients’ genetic ancestry (GA) – which is the information about people who are biologically related – is correlated with clinical, histological, and molecular data across different ancestral…

We rounded up a few research highlights from the 2023 Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO), held recently in Madrid, Spain. Two new first-line treatment immunotherapy options Dr. Xinan Sheng presented the RENOTORCH study. Toripalimab is a new immunotherapy infusion, a humanized monoclonal antibody against PD-1. In combination with axitinib as a first-line treatment for advanced RCC, interim results…

Three analyses of the LITESPARK trial examining the hypoxia-inducible factor 2a (HIF-2a) belzutifan (Welireg) showed efficacy and benefit for this novel therapy over comparator treatments in advanced clear cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC) as well as at multiple doses. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rwHg9yazz4 “I believe [LITESPARK-005] is a practice-changing study and I do want belzutifan to be made available for patients,” said Dr.…

The KCA recently partnered with two advocacy groups on a blog post examining the relationship between exercise and sickle cell trait. https://sickcells.org/blog/exercise-and-sickle-cell-trait-understanding-risks-and-embracing-wellness/ This blog post appears at Sick Cells, a national non-profit advocacy group for sickle cell disease (SCD), and was co-authored with our Affiliate Partner organization the Chris “CJ” Johnson Foundation, a global non-profit supporting individuals diagnosed with renal…

Dr. Brendan Guercio received a 2023 Interdisciplinary RCC Focus Award for research on "Associations of diet with the gut microbiome among patients with advanced/metastatic RCC receiving immune checkpoint inhibition." This award was supported by a gift from the Michael and Ina Korek Foundation. Dr. Guercio is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical…