Patient samples

Following approval by the Ethics Committee of Ruijin Hospital, the kidney surgery Registry database was used to identify patients who were managed with renal cancer surgery from 2008 to 2013. Written informed consent was obtained from all the patients. During this time, 120 patients with complete recorded information and paraffin sections were enrolled in our study, and followed-up for a minimum of three years. Decisions about radical nephrectomy (114 cases) or partial nephrectomy (6 cases) were made by the primary surgeon based on individual tumor and patient conditions. After surgery, 101 patients without metastasis at the initial diagnosis received interferon alpha for one year as the routine sequential treatment. In addition, Sorafenib or Sunitinib was administered in the other 19 patients with metastatic RCC until intolerable side-effects of drugs or disease progression. The main exclusion criteria from this analysis were a lack of a complete recorded file and unavailability of paraffin sections.