INTRODUCTION
May 28th, 2008 by admin
Your kidneys are two bean-shaped organs, each about the size of your fist. They’re located behind your abdomen, one on each side of your spine. Like other major organs in the body, the kidneys can sometimes develop cancer. In adults, the most common type of kidney cancer is renal cell carcinoma (renal adenocarcinoma), which begins in the cells that line the small tubes within your kidneys. Children are more likely to develop a kind of kidney cancer called Wilms’ tumor.
Kidney cancer seldom causes problems in its early stages. But as a tumor grows, you may notice blood in your urine or experience unintentional weight loss or back pain that doesn’t go away. Kidney cancer cells may also spread (metastasize) outside your kidneys to nearby organs as well as to more distant sites in the body. Yet if kidney cancer is detected and TREATED earilier.
Signs and symptoms
Kidney cancer rarely causes signs or symptoms in its early stages. In the later stages, the most common sign of both renal cell and transitional cell cancers is blood in the urine (hematuria). You may notice the blood when you urinate, or your doctor may detect it by urinalysis, a test that specifically checks the contents of your urine. Other possible signs and symptoms may include:
§ A pain in the back just below the ribs that doesn’t go away
§ A mass in the area of the kidneys that’s discovered during an examination
§ Weight loss
§ Fatigue
Intermittent fever
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