PREDICT-Kidney: a co-designed tool to personalise kidney cancer follow-up

A blog from Dr Chiara Re, Research Fellow at University of Cambridge.

Supporting better decisions after kidney cancer surgery 

For most patients treated for kidney cancer, the journey does not end with surgery. Up to 30% will experience recurrence within five years, making a transition to follow-up care essential but often challenging. Guidelines recommend tailoring surveillance to a patient’s recurrence risk, but implementation varies between centres. Patients report little communication of information about their risk and a lack of transparency around decision-making.  

To address this challenge, researchers at the University of Cambridge, including the UMVI’s co-lead Professor Grant Stewart, have developed PREDICT-Kidney, a patient-facing online tool designed to support clinicians when communicating personalised recurrence risk after surgery. 

A co-designed approach 

PREDICT-Kidney was developed through a qualitative co-design process involving patients, members of the public, and healthcare professionals across the United Kingdom. Through a series of workshops in which we showcased the tool, participants,  shared feedback, and evaluated changes.   

This iterative process led to substantial refinement of the initial prototype tool, with changes made to terminology, visual design, and content in response to patient and clinician feedback.  Importantly, this approach ensured that the final tool reflects not only clinical priorities but also patient needs and expectations. 

How the tool works 

PREDICT-Kidney is a web-based tool that generates personalised estimates of kidney cancer recurrence in the ten years following surgery. By entering patient-specific characteristics clinicians obtain risk predictions based on an established prognostic model. The tool also includes an adjustment for the competing risk of death from other causes. This provides a more holistic assessment of patient prognosis, rather than relying solely on tumour pathology. Results are presented using multiple visual formats to support understanding, alongside a printable report that patients can take away after the consultation (See images below).  

Looking ahead 

PREDICT-Kidney represents a promising step towards more personalised follow-up care in kidney cancer. A multicentre feasibility study is underway to evaluate its implementation in urology clinics, including measuring its impact on patient understanding and satisfaction with follow-up care.  

This work also highlights the importance of co-design with stakeholders in developing digital health tools. By integrating patient and clinician perspectives into the design process, we have developed a tool that balances the needs of both groups. next steps include integrating information about adjuvant immunotherapy to support shared decision-making about this new treatment option.  

Read the full paper here: 

Re et al. (2026) Development of the PREDICT-Kidney online tool to promote informed decision-making about kidney cancer follow-up care: a qualitative co-design study. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2025-110668.