Surgical therapy for lung cancer (original) (raw)

1996, Medical Update for Psychiatrists

Lung cancer remains a major public health problem because it is the leading cause of cancer death in men and women. The traditional surgical role for lung cancer has been for patients with limited disease; that approach resuited in an overall five year survival of 18-20%. During the past decade, increasing attention has been paid to expanding the group of patients for whom surgical resection could be accomplished. The net effect of aggressive surgical intervention, addition of multimodality therapy, and improved understanding of perioperative and postoperative management has been improved survival in stages I, II, and III. At this time a non-small cell cancer of the lung should be surgically staged and based on stage, therapy should be designed. Multimodality therapy is an important adjunct to stage II1A and stage IIIB patients. With a multidisciplinary approach to lung cancer, patients in stages I, II, IIIA, and IIIB may all be candidates for resection and cure. Patients in stage IV are candidates for palliative intervention although no long-term impact on survival has been achieved. Early detection, prompt evaluation, surgical staging, and multidisciplinary therapy are the current standards by which the overall outcome of patients with non-small cell cancer of the lung will be improved. MEDICAL

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