Renal Cell Carcinoma subtyping: learning from multi-resolution localization

Its mortality rate is considered high, with respect to its incidence rate, as this tumor is typically asymptomatic at the early stages for many patients [1, 2]. This leads to a late diagnosis of the tumor, where the curability likelihood is lower. RCC can be categorized into multiple histological subtypes, mainly: Clear Cell Renal Cell Carcinoma (ccRCC) forming 75% of RCCs, Papillary Renal Cell Carcinoma (pRCC) accounting for 10%, and Chromophobe Renal Cell Carcinoma (chRCC) accounting for 5%. Some of the other sutypes include Collecting Duct Renal Cell Carcinoma (cdRCC), Tubulocystic Renal Cell Carcinoma (tRCC), and unclassified [1]. Approximately 10% of renal tumors belong to the benign entities neoplasms, being Oncocytoma (ONCO) the most frequent subtype with an incidence of 3-7% among all RCCs [3, 2]. These subtypes show different cytological signature as well as histological features [2], which ends up in significantly different prognosis. The correct categorization of the tumor subtype is indeed of major importance, as prognosis and treatment approaches depend on it and on the disease stage. For instance, the overall 5-year survival rate significantly differs among the different histological subtypes, being 55-60% for ccRCC, 80-90% for pRCC and 90% for chRCC.