Clinical trial: Talc in Treating Patients With Malignant Pleural Effusion (NCT00002622)

Eligibility criteria:
DISEASE CHARACTERISTICS: Unilateral malignant pleural effusion requiring sclerosis (as
        judged by the attending surgeon) At least 3 months since treatment of contralateral
        effusion No chylous effusion

        PATIENT CHARACTERISTICS: Age: 18 and over Performance status: ECOG 0-2 Life expectancy:
        More than 2 months Hematopoietic: Not specified Hepatic: Not specified Renal: Not specified
        Other: Able to undergo thoracoscopy under general or local anesthesia (as determined by the
        attending surgeon) Not pregnant Tests and observations must be completed within 1 week
        prior to randomization (chest x-ray within 1 week prior to procedure)

        PRIOR CONCURRENT THERAPY: No prior intrapleural therapy No systemic therapy within 2 weeks
        prior to randomization or 2 weeks post pleurodesis Biologic therapy: Not specified
        Chemotherapy: No new systemic chemotherapy for 2 weeks prior to and at least 2 weeks after
        pleurodesis Endocrine therapy: No new hormonal therapy for 2 weeks prior to and at least 2
        weeks after pleurodesis No concurrent steroids used as antiemetics Radiotherapy: Prior
        radiotherapy allowed No radiotherapy to entire hemithorax Palliative irradiation of
        symptomatic bone lesions allowed on the affected side if field does not include a
        significant portion of pleura Surgery: See Disease Characteristics
No condition on gender to be admitted to the trial.
No healthy subjects accepted to join the trial.
Subject must be at least 18 Years old.
Subject must be at most 120 Years

Patient description (medical language): A 61-year-old man comes to the clinic due to nonproductive cough and progressive dyspnea.  The patient's medical conditions include hypertension, hypercholesteremia and peptic ulcer disease.  He smokes 2 packs of cigarettes daily for the past 30 years.  On examination, there are decreased breath sounds and percussive dullness at the base of the left lung.  Other vital signs are normal. Abdomen is soft without tenderness. CT scan shows a left-sided pleural effusion and nodular thickening of the pleura. The plural fluid was bloody on thoracentesis. Biopsy shows proliferation of epithelioid-type cells with very long microvilli.

Patient description (patient's own words): I am 61 and I had to go to the clinic because I couldn't stop coughing and I experienced some breath shortness. I suffer from hypertension and cholesterol and I also have a stomach ulcer. I should admit that I've been smoking 2 packs of cigarettes every day for the past 30 years. My doctor told me that my breath in my left lung sounds bad. But he told me that my blood pressure, heart rate, breathing rate and temperature are normal. My belly is also normal. However my X-Rays show some liquid on the left side and a mass where the liquid got hard. The scary thing is that the liquid was bloody when they got it out. They did a biopsy and it showed that I have an increase of epithelioid-type cells with very long microvilli.

Does the patient match the trial criteria? Entailment