Clinical characteristics and treatment results of large cell lung cancer-62 case report

Objective: Objective To evaluate the clinical characteristics and treatment results of 60 patients with large cell lung cancer (LCLC). Methods: All sixty-two patients were diagnosed histopathologically with 5 in stage I, 13 in stage II, 30 in stage III and 14 in stage IV. Forty-five patients received primary surgical resection with 38 radical resection and 7 palliative resection. Non-surgical treatment was given to 17 patients. Mediastinum and ipsilateral hilum were treated to the total dose of 40-60 Gy in 4-6 weeks in 16 patients as postoperative adjuvant radiotherapy. For patients treated by radiation alone, the primary tumor bed, bilateral mediastinum and ipsilateral hilum were treated to the total dose of 36-70 Gy in 4-7 weeks. Results: The overall 1-, 3- and 5- year survival rates were 25.7%, 15.4% and 11.6%, respectively with the median survival time of 11.6 months. In the radically resected patients, the 1-, 3- and 5-year survival rates and the median survival time were 51.3%, 24.7%, 24.7% and 13 months, compared to those of 0%, 0%, 0% and 2 months in the palliatively resected group. In non-surgical treatment group, the 1-, 3- and 5-year survival rates and the median survival time were 41.2%, 21.2%, 7.0% and 11 months, respectively. Conclusions: The prognosis of large cell lung cancer is poor due to high distant metastasis rate. The long-term survival rate after radical resection is worse than the other lung cancers, but similar to the non-surgical treatment. (authors)