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Preparing for Follow-up Care

Children with renal cell sarcoma of the kidney require close follow-up care, because monitoring is needed to detect any recurrence of the cancer or any health problems related to living with one kidney. Generally, these visits occur every 3 months for the first 2 years, every 6 months for the third and fourth year, then once yearly thereafter. The exact schedule may change based on particular concerns with your child. Long-term follow-up (five or more years post-therapy) visits should be scheduled every year in a late-effects clinic.

You can prepare a Cancer Treatment Summary to help your child's primary care physician better understand the follow-up care he or she needs. This is a "laundry list" of information concerning your child's time as a cancer patient. You can ask your son or daughter's doctor at the end of treatment to provide you with much of the needed information (long-term follow-up clinics usually prepare a cancer treatment summary for each patient under their care).

The list should include:

• Date of diagnosis, site, and stage
• Dates and sites of any relapses
• Name, address, and phone number of the hospital(s) from which your child received care
• Dates and sites of any surgeries
• Any complications during treatment (especially those that may affect your child's future health)
• For Stage IV tumors only: If chemotherapy was given, list all of the chemotherapy drugs taken, dosage, and how they were taken. If radiation was given, list the dates, sites, dose per treatment, total dose, and types.
• Blood product exposures and dates it occurred

Be sure to keep a copy of the Cancer Treatment Summary for your son or daughter, but also give one to his or her current healthcare provider.