Treatment outcome of locally advanced stage IIIA/B lung cancer

Abstract

Objective. To determine survival of patients with stage IIIA/B non-small cell lung cancer considering disease stage and treatment methods. Material and methods. A total of 304 patients with non-small cell lung cancer were treated at the Department of Thoracic Surgery and Oncology, Institute of Oncology, Vilnius University, in 2000-2004. Stage IIIA (T3N1-2M0) cancer was diagnosed for 193 (63.5%) patients and stage IIIB (T4N0-1M0) cancer was diagnosed for 111 (36.5%) patients. There were 277 (91.1%) males and 27 (8.9%) females. According to morphology, there were 219 (72%) patients with squamous cell lung cancer, 80 (26.3%) with adenocarcinoma, and 5 (1.7%) patients with large cell carcinoma. Surgery was performed in 145 patients: 84 (57.9%) patients underwent lung resection (T3-4N0-1M0), 51 (35.2%) patients - thoracotomy, and 10 (6.7%) patients - other palliative thoracic procedures (mediastinotomy, pleurectomy, mediastinoscopy). Forty-eight (30.2%) patients were treated with radiation therapy with total doses of >40 Gy and 58 (36.5%) patients were treated with radiation therapy with total doses of <40 Gy. Fifty-four (33.9%) patients were treated with Gemzar and cisplatin and 19 (11.9%) patients were treated with etoposide and cisplatin.