Radiation May Perform Better than Surgery For Late Stage Lung Cancer

A new European study found that after the initialreceived the surgery. According to HealthDay, "the
treatment for chemotherapy, radiation treatmentfive-year survival rate was 15.7 percent for those
may be a better solution than surgery for patientswho had surgery compared with 14 percent for
suffering from advanced non-small cell lung cancer.those treated with radiation. While the survival rates
Non-small lung cancer accounts for about 80 percentwere similar, radiation was the preferred treatment
of all lung cancer cases reported. The new study wasbecause of its lower rates of complications and
reported in the Journal of the National Cancerdeath." The study's authors wrote, "these results are
Institute, examined 579 patients suffering from lateimportant, because several centers routinely use
stage, non-small lung cancer that had advanced tochemotherapy followed by surgery to treat patients
the point where surgery could not effectivelywith this stage of disease based on small randomized
remove all of the cancer. All of the patients hadstudies that showed that surgery alone in inferior to
received three cycles of chemotherapy. Afterchemotherapy and surgery in stage IIIA patients."
chemo, 165 received radiation treatment and 167For more related articles or to subscribe to our feed
received surgery for the remaining cancer. Onplease visit this Consumer Advocacy website for
average, the patients receiving the radiation survivedmore information on ordering from an online no
17.5 months compared to 16.4 months for those whoprescription pharmacy.