Potential impact on survival of improved tumor downstaging and resection rate by preoperative twice-daily radiation and concurrent chemotherapy in stage IIIA non-small-cell lung cancer.

Abstract

Concurrent chemoradiotherapy using twice-daily radiation is an effective induction regimen that resulted in 67% tumor downstaging, and an encouraging 37% 5-year survival rate. The degree of tumor downstaging may be a useful intermediate end point for survival benefit in stage IIIA (N2) NSCLC.