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Preoperative irradiation of cancer of the lung: Preliminary report of a therapeutic trial a collaborative study
Publication year - 1969
Publication title -
cancer
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.052
H-Index - 304
eISSN - 1097-0142
pISSN - 0008-543X
DOI - 10.1002/1097-0142(196902)23:2<419::aid-cncr2820230217>3.0.co;2-6
Subject(s) - medicine , radiation therapy , lung cancer , cancer , radiation oncologist , citation , clinical trial , surgery , general surgery , oncology , library science , computer science
Between May 1963 and December 1966, 17 medical centers cooperated in two separate but integrated therapeutic trials of primary pulmonary cancer. One study was of patients with lesions considered operable at the time of diagnosis, and the other of patients with regional spread but who were considered potentially operable after initial radiotherapy. Patients operable at the time of diagnosis were randomly assigned to receive either immediate surgery (278 patients) or preoperative radiotherapy followed by surgery (290 patients). The life table estimates of 3‐year survival rates for these two groups are nearly identical. On the basis of numbers available, an advantage of more than 8% in the 3‐year survival rate for immediate surgery or of more than 7% for preoperative radiotherapy is unlikely. Surgical complications were somewhat more frequent in the prior radiotherapy group, particularly in those who did not have complete resection of the irradiated lung. The proportion with disease at 1 year, whether as local recurrence or as distant metastasis, was similar in the two treatment groups. Four hundred twenty‐five patients initially considered to be inoperable because of regional spread were given radiotherapy. In 152 of these patients the cancers were considered resectable after radiotherapy. These patients were randomly assigned to have either a thoracotomy and resection of their cancer if possible (78 patients) or no surgery (74 patients). Differences between the two groups with respect to survival are small and not statistically significant.