The paper describes the personal experience with one-stage operations for bilateral nephroblastoma (BN) in children.
In 2000 to 2012, the Research Institute of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology, N.N. Blokhin Russian Cancer Research Institute, performed one-stage surgical interventions in 21 (26.2 %) children with BN. Their age ranged from 10 months to 5 years. The one-stage surgery as bilateral nephrectomy was made in 9 children. Nephrectomy with one-stage resection of the contralateral kidney was carried out in 4 children; 4 patients underwent one-stage surgery as resection of one kidney and biopsy of the other and 4 patients had nephrectomy and biopsy of the second kidney.
BN is a rare disease as suggested by the data available in the world literature; each new report on patients with BN is of great scientific and practical interest. The rate of BN is 4 to 10 % of all kidney cancers in children. Synchronous and metachronous kidney injuries are encountered in 5–7 and 2–3 % of cases, respectively. Bilateral renal involvement is more commonly diagnosed in younger children. The major peak incidence of BN occurs from ages 3 to 5 years. The disease is rarely diagnosed in children above 10 years. Boys and girls are equally frequently ill.