A large, international analysis of patients with stage IV non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) indicates that a patient’s overall survival (OS) rate can be related to factors including the timing of when metastases develop and lymph node involvement, and that aggressive treatment for “low-risk” patients leads to a five-year OS rate of 47.8 percent, according to research presented at the American Society for Radiation Oncology’s (ASTRO’s) 56th Annual Meeting.
When lung cancer has spread from an original tumor to other sites of the body, it is classified as metastatic (Stage IV), and the goal of treatment is to slow the cancer down with chemotherapy or radiation, but these treatments are unable to eradicate the cancer and survival is usually in the range of only a few months.
However, when there are only a few locations of metastatic lung cancer (called oligo-metastatic), some studies suggest that by removing or eradicating each of those cancer deposits with aggressive treatments such as surgery or high-dose, precise radiation called stereotactic ablative radiotherapy or SABR, the cancer may be controlled for a long period of time.
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From Medical News Today
