Kidney Cancer Clinical Trials
Why Participate in a Clinical Trial?
Progress in the war against cancer can only be made through clinical trials. You may consider participating in a clinical trial for reasons, including:
- No current treatment exists for your type of kidney cancer
- There is a new treatment targeting kidney cancer with your genomic profile available only through clinical trial
- You want access to the newest, most innovative treatment approach for kidney cancer
- Previous treatment failed or was not as effective as you hoped
- You want to help expand medical knowledge about cancer that will benefit patients in the future
What is a Clinical Trial?
How Does a Clinical Trial Work?
Protocol
A clinical trial has a protocol that outlines every detail of the study. The protocol is approved and monitored by your hospital’s Institutional Review Board (IRB) to protect your safety and your rights. Protocol includes:
- Principal investigator (usually a doctor or Ph.D. researcher) who is responsible for the clinical trial at your hospital.
- Objective of the clinical trial
- Data the clinical trial will be collecting
- Patient enrollment criteria
- Length of the study, including enrollment period, treatment and follow-up surveillance
- How the treatment will be delivered/dosage/frequency
- Required testing participants will undergo
Enrollment Criteria
Each clinical trial has enrollment criteria. Participants will be screened to make sure they meet these criteria, which may include:
- Type and stage of kidney cancer
- Age range
- Medical history
- Overall health status
Key Terms in Clinical Trials
Randomized: Randomized clinical trials assign patients to a study group. The assignment is random. This way researchers can measure how well a new treatment works compared to a currently available treatment.
Blinded: If a clinical trial is blind, patients do not know which treatment they receive. If a clinical trial is double-blind, neither the researchers nor the patients know who receives which treatment. This prevents patients and researchers from unknowingly influencing the results.
Placebo Group: Placebo groups are rare in cancer clinical trials. A placebo is designed to look like the treatment but has no effect. It may be used when a new treatment is added to a current treatment to keep the study blinded.
What Should I Know Before Enrolling?
- Enrolling in a clinical trial is completely voluntary and you can withdraw at any time
- You are not guaranteed any benefit compared to standard treatment
- You may experience unforeseen side effects
- A clinical trial can demand more time and testing than standard treatment
- Being part of a clinical trial can be rewarding, knowing you are helping advance cancer treatments for today and the future
Search Current Clinical Trials for Kidney Cancer