Kidney cancer, the most lethal of all urological cancers and the 7th commonest cancer in the UK, is largely curable if detected at an early stage, but most patients have no symptoms.
In the Yorkshire Kidney Screening Trial (YKST), researchers from the University of Cambridge are collaborating with colleagues in Leeds to assess how feasible it is to add abdominal CT scanning for kidney cancer, to the ongoing Yorkshire Lung Screening Trial (YLST).
YKST opened to recruitment in May 2021, and an excellent collaboration between the University of Cambridge, University of Leeds, Leads Teaching Hospitals Trust (LTHT) and Yorkshire Cancer Research (YCR) has resulted in YKST being one of the most successful recruiting trials in LTHT last year.
The kidney scan fits well within the flow of the Leeds Lung Health Check in YLST, and by the end of February 2022, YKST had recruited almost 2600 participants to the study (over 10 months of recruitment).
Watch this video to find out more about the YKST, which funded by Yorkshire Cancer Research, and the positive impact it is already having on people who have taken part.
Professor Grant Stewart who co-leads our Urological Malignancies Programme said: "To establish if screening is possible, we piggyback on the Leeds Lung Health Check and offer an extra CT scan for kidney cancer to those taking part in this important clinical trial. The extra scan takes just 10 seconds.
"The Yorkshire Kidney Screening Trial is the first study in the world to address uncertainties and test the clinical rationale and logistics required to see if we can develop a full kidney cancer screening clinical trial within a lung health check programme.
"By the end of the feasibility study, we will understand whether we can and should undertake a full kidney cancer screening clinical trial as we’ll know whether people are likely to take up this extra scan."
The YKST Trial Steering and Data Monitoring Committees are both very happy with the progress of the study so far and are happy for it to continue.
