ReviewFrontiers in immunology2021
Re-Evaluating the Effects of Obesity on Cancer Immunotherapy Outcomes in Renal Cancer: What Do We Really Know?
Review in Frontiers in immunology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 23 citations in OpenAlex.
- Pooled it
- The Role of Body Mass Index in Determining the Efficacy of Nivolumab for Patients with Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer.Medical science monitor : international medical journal of experimental and clinical research · 2025Article
- Microenvironmental determinants of cancer progression during obesity: emerging evidence and novel perspectives.Journal of translational medicine · 2025Review
- The Role of Obesity in the Regulation of Immunosuppressive Cell Infiltration and Immunosurveillance in Cancers.Diseases (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Body composition and checkpoint inhibitor treatment outcomes in advanced melanoma: a multicenter cohort study.Journal of the National Cancer Institute · 2025Article
- Mechanisms by which obesity regulates inflammation and anti-tumor immunity in cancer.Biochemical and biophysical research communications · 2024Review
- Obesity-related T cell dysfunction impairs immunosurveillance and increases cancer risk.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Unraveling the obesity paradox in small cell lung cancer immunotherapy: unveiling prognostic insights through body composition analysis.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Article
- Molecular Linkage between Immune System Disorders and Atherosclerosis.Current issues in molecular biology · 2023Review
- Pathophysiology of obesity and its associated diseases.Acta pharmaceutica Sinica. B · 2023Review
- Nonlinear association between body mass index and overall survival in advanced NSCLC patients treated with immune checkpoint blockade.Cancer immunology, immunotherapy : CII · 2023Article
- Association of computed tomography-based body composition with survival in metastatic renal cancer patient received immunotherapy: a multicenter, retrospective study.European radiology · 2023Article
- Mechanisms and clinical implications in renal carcinoma resistance: narrative review of immune checkpoint inhibitors.Cancer drug resistance (Alhambra, Calif.) · 2023Review
- Partial Nephrectomy Versus Radical Nephrectomy for Endophytic Renal Tumors: Comparison of Operative, Functional, and Oncological Outcomes by Propensity Score Matching Analysis.Frontiers in oncology · 2022Article
- Leptin Protein Expression and Promoter Methylation in Ovarian Cancer: A Strong Prognostic Value with Theranostic Promises.International journal of molecular sciences · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Obesity has reached global epidemic proportions and its effects on interactions between the immune system and malignancies, particularly as related to cancer immunotherapy outcomes, have come under increasing scrutiny. Although the vast majority of pre-clinical murine studies suggest that host obesity should have detrimental effects on anti-tumor immunity and cancer immunotherapy outcomes, the opposite has been found in multiple retrospective human studies. As a result, acceptance of the "obesity paradox" paradigm, wherein obesity increases cancer risk but then improves patient outcomes, has become widespread. However, results to the contrary do exist and the biological mechanisms that promote beneficial obesity-associated outcomes remain unclear. Here, we highlight discrepancies in the literature regarding the obesity paradox for cancer immunotherapy outcomes, with a particular focus on renal cancer. We also discuss multiple factors that may impact research findings and warrant renewed research attention in future studies. We propose that specific cancer patient populations may be affected in fundamentally different ways by host obesity, leading to divergent effects on anti-tumor immunity and/or immunotherapy outcomes. Continued, thoughtful analysis of this critical issue is therefore needed to permit a more nuanced understanding of the complex effects of host obesity on cancer immunotherapy outcomes in patients with renal cancer or other malignancies.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.