The percentage of patients alive at five years or greater increases as well. The median follow up in the study is now over four years. We're seeing substantial numbers of patients five years or later after treatment, which was infrequently seen in a disease that is the most common cause of cancer-related death in this country and worldwide. When you go from 14 to 17 months in median survival time, that's a substantial improvement. Locally advanced non-small cell lung cancer is diagnosed annually in approximately 50,000 Americans.
Surgery offers little to such patients, leaving radiation and chemotherapy.
Patients in the current study were assigned to one of three arms. Patients in arm one received the standard sequential chemotherapy and chest radiation. In arm three, patients were given a slightly different schedule of the chemotherapy, along with radiation therapy twice daily. This study provides strong support for continuing to investigate chemotherapy and radiation delivered concurrently. Patients did experience an increase in side effects, such as difficulty swallowing and bone marrow suppression and anemia.