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Special Treatment Issues^*

^* From the Multidisciplinary Thoracic Oncology Program, Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery (Dr. Detterbeck), University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC; Division of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery (Dr. Jones), University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA; Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery (Dr. Kernstine), University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, Iowa City, IA; Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery (Dr. Naunheim), St. Louis University Health Sciences Center, St. Louis, MO.

Correspondence to: Frank C. Detterbeck, MD, FCCP, Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Department of Surgery, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, CB #7065, 108 Burnett-Womack Building, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7065; e-mail: fdetter{at}med.unc.edu

This chapter of the Lung Cancer Guidelines addresses patients with particular forms of non-small cell lung cancer that require special considerations. This includes patients with Pancoast tumors, T4N0,1M0 tumors, satellite nodules in the same lobe, synchronous and metachronous multiple primary lung cancers (MPLC), and solitary metastases. For patients with a Pancoast tumor, a multimodality approach, involving chemoradiotherapy and surgical resection, appears optimal provided appropriate staging has been carried out. Patients with central T4 tumors that do not have mediastinal node involvement are uncommon. When carefully staged and selected, however, such patients appear to benefit from resection as part of the treatment as opposed to chemoradiotherapy alone. Patients with a satellite lesion in the same lobe as the primary tumor have a good prognosis and require no modification of the approach to evaluation and treatment from what would be dictated by the primary tumor alone. On the other hand, it is difficult to know how best to treat patients with a focus of the same type of cancer in a different lobe. Although MPLC do occur, the survival results after resection for either a synchronous presentation or a metachronous presentation with an interval of < 4 years between tumors are variable and generally poor, suggesting that many of these patients may have had a pulmonary metastasis rather than a second primary lung cancer. A thorough and careful evaluation of these patients is warranted to try to differentiate between patients with a metastasis and those with a second primary lung cancer, although criteria to distinguish them have not been defined. Finally, some patients with a solitary focus of metastatic disease in the brain or adrenal gland appear to benefit substantially from resection.

Key Words: adrenal metastasis • brain metastasis • carina • metachronous primary lung cancers • multiple primary lung cancer • Pancoast tumor • satellite nodules • superior sulcus tumor • superior vena cava • synchronous primary lung cancers • T4N0,1M0 tumor