If you have extensive SCLC and are in fairly good health, chemotherapy (chemo), possibly along with an immunotherapy drug, is typically the first treatment. This can often shrink the cancer, treat your symptoms, and help you live longer. The most common combination of chemo drugs is etoposide plus either cisplatin or carboplatin.
What chemo drugs are used to treat SCLC?
The chemo drugs used are usually etoposide plus either cisplatin or carboplatin. Concurrent chemoradiation can help people with limited stage SCLC live longer and give them a better chance at a cure than giving one treatment (or one treatment at a time).
What are the treatments for small cell lung cancer?
See Drugs Approved for Small Cell Lung Cancer for more information. Laser therapy is a cancer treatment that uses a laser beam (a narrow beam of intense light) to kill cancer cells. An endoscope is a thin, tube-like instrument used to look at tissues inside the body.
How do cancer clinical trials help cancer patients?
Each trial answers certain scientific questions in order to find new and better ways to help cancer patients. During treatment clinical trials, information is collected about the effects of a new treatment and how well it works.
What are the treatment options for SCLC with extensive stage?
Extensive stage SCLC has spread too far for surgery or radiation therapy to be useful as the initial treatment. If you have extensive SCLC and are in fairly good health, chemotherapy (chemo), possibly along with an immunotherapy drug, is typically the first treatment. This can often shrink the cancer, treat your symptoms, and help you live longer.
What is the best treatment for small cell lung cancer?
Combined-modality treatment with etoposide and cisplatin with thoracic radiation therapy (TRT) is the most widely used treatment for patients with limited-stage disease (LD) SCLC.
What is first-line treatment for metastatic lung cancer?
Platinum doublet chemotherapy has historically been the standard first-line therapy for patients who are diagnosed with metastatic lung adenocarcinoma without a targetable mutation.
What is first-line therapy for NSCLC?
In advanced NSCLC, chemotherapy is recommended as first-line treatment in patients with good performance status. Treatment objectives are survival, quality of life and symptom control improvement. Cisplatin-based chemotherapy with one of the effective regimens should be used.
What is frontline cancer treatment?
The first treatment given for a disease. It is often part of a standard set of treatments, such as surgery followed by chemotherapy and radiation. When used by itself, first-line therapy is the one accepted as the best treatment.
Can small cell lung cancer go into remission?
Chemotherapy is the keystone in the treatment of small cell lung cancer (SCLC). Objective remission and good palliation is achieved in ∼80% of the patients, but the remissions are in general short (mean <1 yr), and few are cured.
What is the newest treatment for lung cancer?
Atezolizumab is approved to treat some people with non-small cell lung cancer after surgery. An immune checkpoint inhibitor is a drug that blocks proteins on immune system cells which then allows them to fight cancer.
What is first line and second line treatment?
Second-line treatment is treatment for a disease or condition after the initial treatment (first-line treatment) has failed, stopped working, or has side effects that aren't tolerated. It's important to understand "lines of treatment" and how they differ from first line treatment and can play a role in clinical trials.
How long does it take for a lung tumor to shrink after radiation?
Most can be expected to improve within a few weeks after radiation therapy is completed. Throughout the course of your radiation therapy for lung cancer, it will be important for you to communicate candidly with your physician. If you experience any unpleasant side effects, there may be options to help you manage them.
Is etoposide used for NSCLC?
Reasons why EP (etoposide/cisplatin) has been used to treat non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), despite the fact that etoposide has demonstrated only a modest degree of activity against this disease, are preclinical suggestions of cisplatin/etoposide synergism and successful results for the combination in treating ...
Is adjuvant therapy considered first-line?
Therefore, a better term would probably be "first-line treatment regimen or protocol." Neoadjuvant therapy, chemotherapy given before surgery to reduce the size of a tumor, or adjuvant therapy, given after surgery to reduce the risk of recurrence, are considered components of first-line therapy in this setting.
What is line of therapy in oncology?
A doctor who treats people with cancer is called an oncologist. The initial treatment is referred to as first-line treatment or first-line therapy. This treatment is usually what worked best in clinical trials for people with the same type and stage of cancer.
What is first-line medication?
a drug that is the first choice for treating a particular condition because it is considered a very effective treatment for that condition with the least likelihood of causing side effects. A first-line medication may be a class of drugs (e.g., SSRIs for depression) as well as a single drug.
What is the first treatment for SCLC?
If you have extensive SCLC and are in fairly good health, chemotherapy (chemo), possibly along with an immunotherapy drug, is typically the first treatment. This can often shrink the cancer, treat your symptoms, and help you live longer.
Why is it important to understand the goal of any further treatment before it starts?
You should understand if it’s to try to cure the cancer, to slow its growth, or to help relieve symptoms. It is also important to understand the benefits and risks.
What happens if cancer grows back?
If the cancer continues to grow during treatment or comes back, any further treatment will depend on the location and extent of the cancer, what treatments you’ve had, and on your health and desire for further treatment. It’s always important to understand the goal of any further treatment before it starts. You should understand if it’s to try to cure the cancer, to slow its growth, or to help relieve symptoms. It is also important to understand the benefits and risks.
What is the best treatment for cancer in the lungs?
If cancer growth in the lungs is causing symptoms such as shortness of breath or bleeding, radiation therapy or other types of treatment, such as laser surgery, can sometimes be helpful. Radiation therapy can also be used to relieve symptoms if the cancer has spread to the bones, brain, or spinal cord.
What is the treatment for chest cancer?
If you are in good health, the standard treatment is chemo plus radiation to the chest given at the same time (called concurrent chemoradiation ). The chemo drugs used are usually etoposide plus either cisplatin or carboplatin.
What to do if you have only one small tumor in your lung?
If you only have one small tumor in your lung and there is no evidence of cancer in lymph nodes or elsewhere, your doctors might recommend surgery to remove the tumor and the nearby lymph nodes.
What to do if you smoke and have lung cancer?
If you smoke, one of the most important things you can do to be ready for treatment is to quit. Studies have shown that patients who stop smoking after a diagnosis of lung cancer tend to have better outcomes than those who don’t.
What is the name of the drug that is used in the Impower150 study?
More recently, a 4-drug regimen of carboplatin, paclitaxel, bevacizumab (Avastin), and atezolizumab (Tecentriq) was approved based on results from the Impower150 study, which compared chemotherapy to chemotherapy plus immunotherapy, and investigated the importance of VEGF inhibition.
Is it important to get genetic testing for NSCLC?
Looking ahead, Sequist said that it is important now more than ever for patients with NSCLC to get genetic testing. Practitioners should remember that chemotherapy/immunotherapy combinations are not standard of care for patients with driver mutations.