Kidney cancer during pregnancy highlights need for renal scans

Chennai: Two pregnancies in Chennai were thrown off course by an unexpected kidney cancer diagnosis, highlighting the need to include renal scans during routine health check-ups.In a brief report in the Asia-Pacific Journal of Clinical Oncology's Uro-Oncology Asia 2026, doctors from the Meridian Super Speciality Hospital found an 8.5cm lump on the right kidney of a 44-year-old woman, who was 12 weeks pregnant, during the ultrasound. A later scan confirmed it was likely to be cancer, renal cell carcinoma. After a team of specialists headed by surgical oncologist Dr Kenny Robert Jeyasimmon talked her through the options—continue the pregnancy and delay surgery, or end the pregnancy and operate early—she and her husband chose to terminate the pregnancy and remove the kidney. "No other treatment was required. She recovered quickly and remains free of disease," he said.Soon after, the same hospital saw a mass on the scan reports of another 32-year-old woman who was eight weeks pregnant. By then, the cancer had already spread to her liver and bones. "Cure was no longer possible. She ended the pregnancy and started on cancer drugs meant for advanced stage of the disease. But she did not come for a follow up afterwards," he said.Doctors say kidney cancer in pregnancy is extremely rare—with only scattered cases reported worldwide—but when it occurs, renal cell carcinoma is the most common type. Also, pregnancy can hide cancer. Many early warning signs—nausea, tiredness, backache—are also typical of early pregnancy, so tumours may be missed until they grow large or spread. If detected early, pregnancies can be saved, he said. Doctors decide case by case, weighing how far along the pregnancy is, how advanced the cancer is, what surgery is possible locally and what the family can afford, he said. "Because it is rare, it is important to screen for it during pregnancy. The same disease, caught earlier in one woman and far later in another, led to different choices," he said.
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