Brachytherapy in the treatment of lung cancer – a valuable solution

Abstract

The majority of patients with lung cancer are diagnosed with clinically advanced disease. Many of these patients have a short life expectancy and are treated with palliative aim. Because of uncontrolled local or recurrent disease, patients may have significant symptoms such as: cough, dyspnea, hemoptysis, obstructive pneumonia, or atelectasis. Brachytherapy is one of the most efficient methods in overcoming difficulties in breathing that is caused by endobronchial obstruction in palliative treatment of bronchus cancer. Efforts to relieve this obstructive process are worthwhile, because patients may experience improved quality of their life (QoL). Brachytherapy plays a limited but specific role in definitive treatment with curative intent in selected cases of early endobronchial disease as well as in the postoperative treatment of small residual peribronchial disease. Depending on the location of the lesion, in some cases brachytherapy is a treatment of choice. This option is fast, inexpensive, and easy to perform on an outpatient basis.Clinical indications, different techniques, results, and complications are presented in this work.

Cross-talk between lung cancer and bones results in neutrophils that promote tumor progression

“…Despite several improvements, treatments like surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy can rarely control completely this disease. Patients with lung cancer have a limited long-term survival, mainly due to the escape of tumor initiating cells of the initial treatment [3]. Since these escaped cells are more resistant to treatments, adjuvant therapies that could effectively destroy these remaining cancer cells would have a considerable impact on tumor treatment.…”

Virtual reality‐assisted localization and three‐dimensional printing‐enhanced multidisciplinary decision to treat radiologically occult superficial endobronchial lung cancer

“…Photodynamic therapy,5 endobronchial brachytherapy,6 and stereotactic ablative radiotherapy7 can be considered to treat early‐stage endobronchial non‐small‐cell lung cancer in patients in which surgical resection is difficult. A certain portion of early‐stage superficial endobronchial squamous cell carcinoma does not display any radiologic abnormality on CT scan 3.…”

“…To our knowledge, this is the first report of successful localization of radiologically occult superficial endobronchial lung cancer using advanced VR endoscopy, followed by the fabrication of 3D-printed model. Photodynamic therapy, 5 endobronchial brachytherapy, 6 and stereotactic ablative radiotherapy 7 can be considered to treat early-stage endobronchial non-small-cell lung cancer in patients in which surgical resection is difficult. A certain portion of early-stage superficial endobronchial squamous cell carcinoma does not display any radiologic abnormality on CT scan.…”

Chinese Expert Consensus Workshop Report: Guideline for permanent iodine‐125 seed implantation of primary and metastatic lung tumors

“…Indications Primary lung cancer: (i) patient is not a candidate for surgery because of inferior cardiopulmonary function or advanced age 24,25 (ii) patient refused surgery; (iii) patient is not a candidate for surgery because of recurrence after surgery 22 (iv) a residual or progressive tumor is observed after surgery, radiotherapy, or chemotherapy 26 (v) thermal ablation or surgery failed to distinguish the tumor-free boundary; 27,28 (vi) Karnofsky Performance Score (KPS) > 60 and predicted life span > 6 months; and (vii) the diameter of largest tumor is < 7 cm. 12 Metastatic lung cancer: (i) the patient has ≤ 3 unilateral lesions ≤ 5 cm in diameter; (ii) if a patient has ≤ 3 bilateral lesions ≤ 5 cm in diameter, these should be treated separately.…”