Progestogens in Renal Cell Carcinoma

Metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC): Spontaneous regression, long-term survival and late recurrence

“…Although initial reports on success with this mode of therapy quoted objective responses in approximatel 3, 16 per cent of the treated patients [3], subsequent studies have failed to support these claims. Recent reports on the effectiveness of progestagens in cases of renal cell cancer show no statistical difference in survival between treated and untreated patients [4]. However, in our case the patient was started on hormonal therapy with the anti-oestrogen Tamoxifen, because her illness was too advanced to consider nephrectomy.…”

Adjunctive Medroxyprogesterone Acetate to Radical Nephrectomy in Category M(0) Renal Cell Carcinoma

“…On the contrary we confirm the negative trend of this kind of adjunctive therapy reported by Bono et al [ 11 ]. Of course a longer follow-up is necessary to draw definite conclu sions and it is our purpose to go on following these patients up to 5 years.…”

“…Consider able enthusiasm arose in Italy around postoperative hor mone therapy when Bracci and Di Silverio [9] reported a significant decrease in the relapse rates of patients treated with adjuvant MPA versus historical controls. But in the mean time the enthusiasm for hormone therapy in meta static RCC has decreased because the response rate drop ped from 17% in the period 1967-1971 to 2% in 1971-1976 and it seemed that, 'as stricter response criteria have been applied to this study population, response rates have shrunk' [10], Besides, in 1979 Bono et al [11] reported no advantage in patients treated with adjunctive MPA. Also this study was retrospective, but an effort was made to statistically compare treated patients and con trols.…”

Determination of Androgen, Progestin and Estrogen Receptors with Two Different Assays in Renal Cell Carcinoma

“…In a first clinical study, Bloom [2] reported a 14% objective response rate in 80 patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma treated with medroxyprogesterone acetate. The beneficial effect of hormonal treatment was confirmed by several authors [3,4], However, other reports claimed that the therapy was ineffective in reduc ing tumor size [5,6]. Some groups have detected steroid hormone receptors in the cytosol of renal cell carcinoma, in detail they found receptors for androgens [7,8], progestins [8][9][10] and estrogens [11], or simultaneously all three of these receptors [12].…”