Surgeon Bias Picks Kidney Cancer Surgery

(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- A patient with kidney cancer often undergoes surgery, but the type of surgery they get could be based on the surgeon’s preference -- not medical factors -- according to new research.

The standard surgical treatment for patients with localized kidney cancer is an open radical nephrectomy. Less invasive options such as a partial nephrectomy or laparoscopic surgery are also available. While the latter provides many benefits to the patient, many surgeons do not opt to do these procedures.

Researchers from the University of California Los Angeles reviewed data on patients diagnosed with kidney cancer from 1997 to 2002. The study included data on more than 5,000 patients. They determined the type of surgery each patient received and also identified the primary surgeon.

Study authors say they looked at several factors including patient demographics, comorbidity, tumor size and volume of surgeries done by each surgeon. They found the surgeon’s preference contributed more to the type of surgery a patient received than any other medical reason. Researchers feel it’s important to bring down the barriers stopping a surgeon from choosing a less invasive operation that could improve the quality of care for a patient with kidney cancer.

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SOURCE: Cancer, published online March 10, 2008