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The results of an international study prove the effectiveness of a treatment combining immunotherapy and chemotherapy in patients with lung cancer. It would improve patient survival and limit the risk of relapse by around 40%.
A very common type of cancer
Lung cancer kills approximately 1.8 million people worldwide, making it the leading cause of cancer death. It is the third most common cancer in France.
Lung cancers are divided into two categories:
- Small cell cancers;
- Non-small cell cancers (NSCSC).
The latter are the most common type of lung cancer, according to the Foundation for Medical Research, found in 85% of diagnosed cases. Despite the rather good chances of recovery thanks to surgical treatment at the non-metastatic stage, the Institut Curie notes that between 30 and 55% of patients have a recurrence.
This is why the improvement of pre-operative treatments, for longer-lasting effectiveness, was at the heart of an international phase 3 scientific study. Published in the medical journal Le New England Journal of Medicineit was Professor Nicolas Girard, oncologist and pulmonologist at the Institut du Thorax Curie-Montsouris, who presented the results at the congress of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR).
Reduce the risk of relapse and improve patient survival
The conclusions of the study are rather significant, because the new treatment tested would reduce the risk of recurrence and death by almost 40%.
To reach these conclusions, the team of researchers administered a neoadjuvant treatment combining immunotherapies and chemotherapy in 358 patients suffering from non-metastatic NSCLC. A neoadjuvant therapy is a complementary therapy given to a patient before the main treatment. Its purpose is often to reduce the size of a tumor before surgery.
In addition, 24% of patients who received this therapeutic combination showed no new cancer cells. Tissue samples were taken during the surgery. This was the case for only 2% of people who received chemotherapy alone.
Also, the new treatment would have reduced the risk of recurrence of non-small cell lung cancer by 37%. On the other hand, the researchers found a marked improvement in patient survival, thanks to a reduction in the risk of death by 43%.
In addition, the patients were followed. Two years after neoadjuvant treatment, 83% of them survived compared to 71% in patients treated with chemotherapy alone.
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What is this new treatment?
This new treatment combines three sessions of immunotherapy as well as chemotherapy for two months, before the operation.
For now, it seems that this neoadjuvant therapy has no negative influence on the surgical procedure or on any postoperative complications. The time of the intervention was significantly shorter.
This new treatment has been so successful that the Food and Drug Administration has already given its approval for early access in the United States.