Signs and Symptoms Associated with Kidney Cancer

* Blood in urine (hematuria)

* Pain in the back just below the ribs

* A mass that can be felt

* Unexplained weight loss which can sometimes be rapid

* Intermittent Fevers or night sweats

* Fatigue and lethargy

* Fever that is not associated with a cold or the flu

* Pain in other parts of the body if the cancer has spread

It has long been known that for each different type of cancer there are distinct risk factors. These factors do not assure that an individual will have cancer, but increase the chances of developing the cancer. The mechanism by which the majority of these risk factors result in cancer is not always known, but epidemiological studies to allow physicians to identify factors which are associated with each different type of cancer.

In the past, the majority of kidney cancers were identified due to symptoms. These characteristic symptoms are still seen in a minority of people who present with larger kidney cancers.
However, today, the majority of kidney cancers are "Incidental findings." The term Incidental finding simply means that the kidney tumor, which is usually small in diameter, was found during the evaluation of a separate process. Often, a sonogram will be ordered for a non-specific complaint and a kidney mass will be identified.

Today, the reason that the majority of kidney tumors are discovered while still very small in size is the increased use of radiologic tests. These tests have become important in Identifying kidney masses as well as in determining if the mass is suspicious forkidney cancer. Unfortunately, with contemporary radiographic technology, it remains impossible to determine if the mass is truly a kidney cancer as opposed to some other non-cancerous growth in the kidney.

Depending on the size of the mass, the probability of kidney cancer can be estimated. Smaller kidney masses can be benign growths of 30-40% of the time. In contrast, larger kidney growths are more commonlykidney cancer (over 90%). Naturally, it would seem that a small procedure like a biopsy to take a small sample of the kidney tissue mass would be Prudent. However, biopsy is not usually indicated for several reasons.