What are the harms of radiotherapy for kidney cancer

Many kidney cancer patients will take radiotherapy, which can quickly cure kidney cancer. In fact, radiotherapy will have some side effects when treating patients, and it will also cause some harm to patients. Many people will have a question mark in their minds. Let's take a look at the hazards of radiotherapy for kidney cancer.

Radiotherapy is one of the conventional treatments for kidney cancer patients. Most people know that radiotherapy has some side effects and it also causes certain harm to the body during treatment. So, what are the specific side effects of chemotherapy for kidney cancer and is there any way to solve it? This is a question that many kidney cancer patients are very concerned about.

Experts said that radiotherapy, as one of the commonly used adjuvant treatment techniques for kidney cancer, has a relatively direct killing effect on cancer cells. As a local treatment, radiotherapy can reduce the recurrence rate of distant metastasis by shrinking the primary tumor and killing the surrounding subclinical lesions. However, the toxic side effects of radiotherapy for kidney cancer should not be ignored.

The side effects of radiotherapy for kidney cancer can cause patients to experience a series of local and systemic reactions, including:

1. The tolerance of normal kidney tissue to radiation is poorer than that of tumor tissue. The most common complications are radiation nephritis or radiation nephropathy. For example, radiotherapy for renal cancer may cause congestion, edema, ulcers or bleeding of the renal mucosa.

2. The acute phase reaction is that radiotherapy affects the proliferation and immune process of renal mucosal epithelial cells, causing mucosal congestion, edema, epithelial cell shedding, and ulcer formation.

3. The chronic stage is manifested by lesions of submucosal blood vessels and connective tissues, occlusive arteriovenitis may occur, and submucosal tissue thickens due to ischemic fibrosis. Submucosal tissue is replaced by scar tissue, vascular tissue is further reduced, and the renal wall thickens, which may cause renal stenosis, renal fistula, etc. In severe cases, renal obstruction. After multiple radiotherapy, rectal vaginal fistula occurs. The indications and radiation doses of radiotherapy must be strictly controlled.

Through reading the above, I believe everyone knows that the rays produced by radiotherapy lack selectivity, so they will kill normal cells while killing tumor cells. In addition, the toxic side effects of radiotherapy itself will cause damage to the patient's body and affect the effect of treatment to a certain extent.