Radical treatment of thoracic tumours may be justified in some patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who already have brain metastases at the time of diagnosis, oncologists have argued.
An Amsterdam-based group reviewed 167 such patients who either had surgery/radiosurgery or whole-brain radiotherapy for their brain lesions. There were 58% who also had therapy for their primary lung tumour after completing treatment of the brain metastases.
‘Aggressive’ cranial treatment with surgery or radiosurgery was associated with a median overall survival of 12.1 months, and one- and two-year survivals of 50% and 22% respectively. This approach even had benefits in stage III disease, with median survivals of 9.4 months and 3.7 months in patients having brain surgery and whole-brain irradiation...
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