Lung Cancer

Radiation oncologists at Allegheny General Hospital (AGH) in Pittsburgh today will report to the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology (ASTRO) in Boston that a newer, minimally invasive approach to treating high risk patients with Stage I non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) may significantly reduce the risk of local disease recurrence. Developed at AGH over the past decade, the procedure involves removing only the cancerous section of the lung and enveloping the surgical site in a mesh material that is embedded with radioactive seeds.

Radiation oncologists at Allegheny General Hospital (AGH) in Pittsburgh today will report to the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology (ASTRO) in Boston that a newer, minimally invasive approach to treating high risk patients with Stage I non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) may significantly reduce the risk of local disease recurrence. Developed at AGH over the past decade, the procedure involves removing only the cancerous section of the lung and enveloping the surgical site in a mesh material that is embedded with radioactive seeds.

Today a large, national clinical trial for non-small cell lung cancer was launched to validate whether a biomarker can predict clinical benefit in the treatment of this disease. Biomarkers, which are molecules found in the body that can signal an abnormal process or disease, would identify a target, known as epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR). This receptor can be increased in some lung cancers due to the presence of extra copies of its coding gene.

While lung cancer in smokers and former smokers is the biggest cancer killer by far, lung cancer in people who have never smoked is -- by itself -- the sixth biggest cancer killer in the United States. "Most people are not aware that lung cancer among non-smokers has such an enormous impact," said Lung Cancer Alliance President Laurie Fenton-Ambrose today. The heavy burden of lung cancer in non-smokers contradicts the common belief that lung cancer is a disease that strikes only smokers.

Lung cancer patients whose tumors carry specific genetic mutations can achieve significantly longer survival when treated with targeted therapies such as erlotinib, Spanish researchers report. Investigators from the Spanish Lung Cancer Group conducted the largest-ever study to examine the benefits of customizing lung cancer treatment based on mutations in the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) gene.

The targeted therapy gefitinib should be considered a first-line therapy for non-smoking Asian patients with adenocarcinoma of the lung, one of the most common types of lung cancer, suggests a presentation at the 33rd Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Stockholm. Asia has a high proportion of lung cancer patients who are non-smokers, a significant proportion of whom develop a form of cancer known as adenocarcinoma.

Pazopanib, a new oral angiogenesis inhibitor, has demonstrated interesting activity in difficult to treat non-small-cell lung cancer, US researchers report. In a phase II trial, 30 out of 35 patients treated with preoperative pazopanib for a minimum of two weeks saw their tumor size shrink by up to 85%. "This is a positive result that will be explored further," said Prof. Nasser Altorki from Weil Medical College of Cornell University in New York. "To my knowledge, no other results on the effect of angiogenesis inhibitors in early stage operable lung cancer have been published.

PITTSBURGH -- Radiation oncologists at Allegheny General Hospital (AGH) in Pittsburgh today will report to the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology (ASTRO) in Boston that a newer, minimally invasive approach to treating high risk patients with Stage I non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) may significantly reduce the risk of local disease recurrence. Developed at AGH over the past decade, the procedure involves removing only the cancerous section of the lung and enveloping the surgical site in a mesh material that is embedded with radioactive seeds.

WASHINGTON, Sept 15, 2008 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- While lung cancer in smokers and former smokers is the biggest cancer killer by far, lung cancer in people who have never smoked is -- by itself -- the sixth biggest cancer killer in the United States. "Most people are not aware that lung cancer among non-smokers has such an enormous impact," said Lung Cancer Alliance President Laurie Fenton-Ambrose today. The heavy burden of lung cancer in non-smokers contradicts the common belief that lung cancer is a disease that strikes only smokers.

The final analysis of the Avastin in lung study (AVAiL) in patients with advanced lung cancer has shown that not only did the drug significantly slow down the disease progression, it also enabled some patients to survive for over 1 year, the longest survival ever reported in patients with this advanced disease. The results were presented today at the 33rd Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Stockholm.