Background : A survival benefit was observed in metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients that underwent operation. But no evidence to support whether lobectomy would further prolong these patients' live than sub-lobar resection.
Methods:Patients that underwent primary tumor resection with metastatic NSCLC were identified from the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database and then divided into lobectomy and sub-lobar resection groups. A 1:1 propensity score matching (PSM) was performed to balance characters. Cancer specific survival (CSS) was estimated.Results: A total of 24,268 patients with metastatic NSCLC were identified; 4,114 (16.95%) received primary tumor surgery, of which 2,045 (49.71%) underwent lobectomy and 1,766 (42.93%) underwent sub-lobar resection. After PSM, 644 patients in each group were included. Lobectomy was independently correlated with longer median CSS time (HR=0.70, 95% CI 0.61-0.80, P<0.001). The 1, 2 and 3-year survival rate after PSM also favored the lobectomy group. However, no significant survival difference was found in wedge resection and segmentectomy (HR=0.96, 95% CI 0.70-1.31, P=0.490). The 1, 2 and 3-year survival rate after PSM also showed no difference within the sub-lobar group. We explore whether lymph node dissection would provide a further survival benefit for stage IV NSCLC patients. According to the multivariate Cox analysis of the matched population, lymph node dissection was independently associated with better CSS (HR=0.76, 95% CI 0.66-0.88, P<0.001) and OS (HR=0.74, 95% CI 0.65-0.86, P<0.001). We confirmed this result in different types of surgery and found lymph node dissection group persist to have better survival outcomes both in lobectomy group and sub-lobar resection population. According to subgroup analysis, except for stage T4 and brain metastasis patients, all subtype of patients would benefit more from lobectomy than sub-lobar resection.Conclusions: Lobectomy brings survival benefit in metastatic NSCLC patients compared with sublobar resection.