Curative radiotherapy of local advanced non-small-cell lung cancer. Eight years of experience from Odense
Hansen, O.; Paarup, H.; Sørensen, P.; Hansen, K.Holmskov.; Werenberg, K.Aage.
Ugeskrift for laeger 167(37): 3497-3502
2005
ISSN/ISBN: 1603-6824 PMID: 16159459 Document Number: 590011
No previous reports on 3-D conformal radiotherapy of Danish patients with inoperable local advanced non-small-cell lung cancer have been published. From 1995 to 2003, 158 patients with inoperable non-small-cell stage III lung cancer received radical radiotherapy in doses of 60-66 Gy in 30-33 fractions. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy was administered to 77 patients. The median survival time was 15.8 months. The one, two-, three-, four-, and five-year survival rates were 61%, 35%, 23%, 19% and 17%, respectively. Gender and age had no influence on survival, while patients in performance status 2 tended to have poorer survival rate than patients in performance status 0-1. The lung function as evaluated byh FEV1 and FVC declined by 8-9% during the first year and was reduced by 9-13% after three years. The cause of death in 90% of the cases was lung cancer. In 50% of all cases, a loco-regional relapse was found, and in 41% distant metastases existed. These results show that a significant number of stage III patients treated with modern radiotherapy with curative intent will be long-term survivors.