Long-Term Toxicities among Wilms Tumor Survivors

Abstract

Successive trials conducted by the National Wilms Tumor Study have resulted in very high cure rates for children with Wilms tumor (WT). These trials have also significantly reduced the indications for doxorubicin and higher doses of RT in WT. Late toxicities after multimodality treatment especially RT, continues to be a major problem among WT survivors. Higher doses of RT is the most important factor responsible for the many late effects including congestive heart failure, secondary malignant neoplasms, hypogonadism, infertility and pregnancy complications, pulmonary disease, musculoskeletal effects, renal failure and diabetes mellitus. The potential for novel RT techniques like IMRT and proton therapy to reduce the incidence of these toxicities is discussed. The surveillance recommendations for WT survivors are mainly derived from the COG long-term follow-up guidelines. The future directions in late effects research include novel research to improve current knowledge of association between RT doses to target organs and late effects, discovery of novel biomarkers, and identification of predictive genetic biomarkers. Despite all these advances, there are significant challenges facing the global health care community that need to be overcome before the benefits of these innovations in late effects research can be translated to individual cancer survivors.