Immunotherapy for kidney cancer

Immunotherapy drugs encourage the body’s immune system to fight cancer cells. They are used to treat kidney cancer that has spread to other parts of the body (advanced or metastatic kidney cancer).

Immunotherapy is not suitable for people with certain medical conditions. Your doctor can talk to you about this.

The following immunotherapy drugs are used to treat kidney cancer (renal cell cancer). These drugs are also called checkpoint inhibitors:

• nivolumab (OPDIVO^®)
• ipilimumab (Yervoy^®) – given in combination with nivolumab
• pembrolizumab (Keytruda^®) – given in combination with a tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) called axitinib (Inlyta^®)
• avelumab (Bavencio^®) – given in combination with axitinib.

Other combinations of checkpoint inhibitors and TKIs are being studied in clinical trials. These treatments may become available when the results are known.

Checkpoint inhibitors can make the immune system too active. This can cause inflammation in parts of the body. The most common parts it can affect are the:

• skin – causing a rash
• thyroid gland – causing it to become overactive or underactive
• bowels – causing diarrhoea
• joints – causing pain and swelling.

More rarely, these drugs cause problems in other places such as the:

• liver
• lung
• heart
• nerves
• brain
• other organs.

This type of side effect may start weeks, months, or sometimes more than a year, after you finish treatment.

Some people have very few side effects. But the side effects of checkpoint inhibitors can be serious. If you have any symptoms or side effects that start during treatment or after treatment finishes, contact your doctor or hospital straight away.