Pulmonary resection of metastatic renal cell carcinoma.

Over a ten-year period, 44 patients with known primary renal cell cancer underwent thoracotomy for pulmonary metastases. The median postthoracotomy survival for all patients was 33 months. The five-year survival was 27 percent. Postthoracotomy survival was significantly better in those patients with a disease free interval of greater than 24 months and patients with metastatic lesions greater than or equal to 3 cm. No difference in survival was detected in patients with one versus more than one lesion or in patients undergoing complete resection versus incomplete resection or biopsy only. Age, sex, grade of tumor, or location of the pulmonary metastasis had no influence on survival.