gms | German Medical Science

27th German Cancer Congress Berlin 2006

German Cancer Society (Frankfurt/M.)

22. - 26.03.2006, Berlin

Long Term Results of Lung Cancer Treatment - Clinical and Population-Based Aspects

Meeting Abstract

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  • corresponding author presenting/speaker Michael Schmidt - Tumorregister München, Deutschland
  • Dieter Hölzel - Tumorregister München

27. Deutscher Krebskongress. Berlin, 22.-26.03.2006. Düsseldorf, Köln: German Medical Science; 2006. DocOP141

The electronic version of this article is the complete one and can be found online at: http://www.egms.de/en/meetings/dkk2006/06dkk251.shtml

Published: March 20, 2006

© 2006 Schmidt et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/deed.en). You are free: to Share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work, provided the original author and source are credited.


Outline

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Objectives: Many studies report improvements in treating lung cancer patients. These studies are often designed for high selected groups of patients. However, when new drugs are applied in routine care the observed benefits possibly vanish in statistics with population based approach. In this presentation, we investigate the results of lung cancer treatment in Southern Bavaria with main focus on comparing subsequent decades of survival outcome stratified by several clinical parameters, also with regard to international statistics.

Methods: The database of the Munich Cancer Registry in Southern Bavaria currently contains profiles of more than 300,000 cancer patients with numerous clinical and epidemiological parameters including complete life status informations. These parameters (e.g. histology, UICC stage and treatment strategies) are utilized in stratified survival analyses for different time periods since 1978. Also, relative survival curves illustrate univariate survival in particular subgroups, and the Cox’s Proportional Hazard Model was performed to simultaneously predict survival of patients with individual risk patterns.

Results: From a total of 13408 lung cancer patients analized 2733 were diagnosed with small cell lung cancer (SCLC) and 10675 with non small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) histology (20.4% and 79.6%, respectively). The 5 year relative survival rate was 9% for the SCLC group and 21% for the NSCLC group. In comparison, the results of SEER revealed about 5% lower survival rates in both subgroups. A substantial change in survival in both histologies over the last 25 years could not be detected in the evaluation. For patients diagnosed after 1990 the range of 5 year survival rates in particular UICC stages was from 32% in UICC I to 3% in UICC IV in SCLC histology and from 66% in UICC I to 4% in UICC IV in NSCLC histology. While changes in SCLC patients were marginal over decades NSCLC patients showed more than 10% improvement of survival in UICC I compared to cases diagnosed before 1990, but no change when already metastasised. The reason for the conflicting results may be a stage migration over the years associated with advancements of diagnostic procedures. This effect is confirmed by multivariate analysis.

Conclusion: A population-based and multidisclipinary documentation of cancer patients is able to provide sufficient results of survival outcome in lung cancer patients. By using these data established therapeutic strategies can be confirmed and guidelines for diagnostic and treatment procedures in patient care can also be optimized. Likewise, these valuing statements are an important feedback for practice.