Treating early stage non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with advanced radiotherapy appears to be a viable alternative to surgery, according to researchers who carried out a retrospective comparative study sponsored by the London-based South East Cancer Oncology Group.
A review was carried out of treatments given to a large number of patients with Stage I NSCLC treated with stereotactic ablative body radiotherapy (SABR) globally over a seven-year period and the findings have been presented in an online edition of Radiotherapy and Oncology. The review suggests that survival rates can be equivalent to surgery for this population of patients, indicating that a non-invasive, out-patient approach is a viable alternative to traditional surgery.
Two-year survival of the 3201 patients with localised stage I NSCLC treated with SABR was 70% with a two-year tumour control rate of 91%. This was compared to a 68% two-year survival of 2038 stage I patients treated with surgery.
"This suggests that SABR may offer a viable alternative to surgery for both inoperable and operable early-stage NSCLC patients," said Dr Francesca Solda, clinical oncologist at Harley Street, who coordinated the study. "Surgery for lung cancer can have significant side effects and long recovery periods, and our research suggests that outcomes can be comparable between surgery and non-invasive stereotactic body radiotherapy."
While these results are promising, the study points out that data were derived from previously published reports, and that a direct comparison between SABR and conventional surgery should be a priority for further research.
Patients at both Harley Street and University College Hospital London are treated using advanced radiosurgery equipment, including the TrueBeam system from Varian Medical Systems for both radiosurgery and conventional fractionated radiotherapy.
