Integrating immunotherapy into chemoradiation regimens for medically inoperable locally advanced non-small cell lung cancer

For patients with inoperable stage II-III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), the backbone of curative intent therapy is concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CRT). As checkpoint inhibitors have shown clinical benefit in the setting of metastatic NSCLC, additional study is necessary to understand their role in patients receiving CRT. When integrating immunotherapy with radiotherapy (RT) for cure, clinicians will need to consider synergy, timing, doses, and safety among the combination of therapies. This article seeks to review data evaluating interactions, temporal sequencing, fractionation, and overlapping toxicity profiles of thoracic chemoradiation and immunotherapy.