Surgical treatment of locally far-advanced lung carcinoma

It has been our policy to employ radical lung resection as a primary treatment whenever possible in locally far-advanced lung cancer. In order to assess the therapeutic results, a total of 132 patients with locally far-advanced lung cancer who had radical lung resection were reviewed. Postoperative mortality was 10%. A significant difference in survival was seen between those patients receiving no adjuvant therapy, radiation or single agent chemotherapy and those receiving cis-platinum-based polychemotherapy and/or immunotherapy (respective median survivals 14.25 and 25.68 months, P <0.05 Breslow test of failure rates). Aggressive surgery followed by effective adjuvant therapy in locally far-advanced Stage III lung carcinoma appears to produce acceptable survival results.