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Neoadjuvant therapy is treatment that is given before surgery to help shrink the tumour and make it easier to remove.
This study involved a small group of patients who were treated with neoadjuvant therapy to shrink their tumour to make it easier to remove during surgery.
All patients were treated with a combination of immunotherapy (pembrolizumab) and targeted therapy (a tyrosine kinase inhibitor) for at least one month before surgery (partial nephrectomy). 90% of patients responded to treatment with a reduction in the size of their tumour, and all were able to have surgery. The average decrease in tumour size was just over 2 cm.
In conclusion, neoadjuvant immunotherapy combinations result in a significant reduction in primary renal tumour size that may help patients who otherwise would not have been able to have a partial nephrectomy to preserve kidney function. This was a small study with only 9 patients, so further work is needed to confirm the results.
