Concurrent Palliative Chemoradiotherapy versus Definitive Chemoradiotherapy in Poor Prognosis Stage III non-small-cell lung cancer

Abstract

Background The palliative role of chemoradiation in treatment of patients with locally advanced non-small-cell lung cancer remains unresolved; Controversy remains about whether long term and high doses radiotherapy provide better results than short course schedules in treatment of inoperable stage III NSCLC and negative prognostic factors poor performance status (PS), large tumor, poor pulmonary functions and comorbidities.Hypofractionated radiotherapy can expose tumors to a high dose of radiation in a short period of time. Methods One hundred and ten patients with locally advanced stage III NSCLC with poor prognosyic factors were randomized to receive either definitive chemoradiation or palliative chemoradiation in cancer department of faculty of medicine of AIN SHAMS UNIVERSITY .Arm (A) patients will receive induction chemotherapy with two cycles of carboplatin(AUC6) and paclitaxel 175mg/m²) cycles every 21 day, the third cycle administrated with radiotherapy with low dose of carboplatin(AUC 2) and paclitaxel 60 mg/m² on day 1& 8 administrated concomitant with the radiotherapy 42 Gy over 15 fraction over 3 weeks. Arm (B) patients will receive standard-dose fractionation of radiation 60Gy/6 weeks 2Gy once per day with concurrent weekly low dose of carboplatin (AUC 2) and paclitaxel 60 mg/m² followed by two cycles of full doses of carboplatin (AUC 6) /paclitaxel 175mg/ m² every 21 days.the primary end points were overall survival and progression free survival;secondary end points were health related quality of life(HRQOL) and toxicity. Results The median follow-up duration was 24 months in surviving patients’ .Median survival and 2-year OS were in concurrent palliative chemoradiation arm 4.7 and 12.3-months respectively and was 7.3 and 17.6 in concurrent definitive chemoradiatiobn arm respectively (p < 0.01). HRQOL was better in the palliative arm during the treatment but remained unchanged in both arms during the follow up visits. There were more hospital admissions related to side effects in the definitive chemoradiation arm (p < 0.05). Conclusions This study confirmed that the definitive chemoradiation was superior to palliative chemoradiation arm with respect to survival.the treatment related toxicity and HRQOL were better in the palliative chemoradiation arm than the definitive arm.