General characteristics and therapeutic options in lung cancer in Turkey

ASPECT study, a prospective multicenter study conducted in Turkey with the participation of 26 centers, including all patients with lung cancer, who agreed to participate in the study, were re-evaluated in terms of demographic characteristics of patients (pts), disease characteristics, and the treatment options in lung cancer. Among 1245 cases (88.7% man) included, %83.4 had advanced stage (stage 3-4) lung cancer. Histopathologic types were squamous cell in 39.3%, adenocancer in 29.6%, SCLC in 19.0%, NSCLC in 10.2% and others. Of the pts, 45.5% had a comorbid disease, 49.3% had weight loss (at least 5% of body weight), and 31.6% had a history of cancer in family. PET-CT was used in 83.3% of the pts for diagnosis of staging. Metastasis was detected in 54.2% of pts (43.9% bone, 23.1% brain, %20.2% liver, 17.3% surrenal metastasis). Treatment options were chemotherapy in 45.9%, chemo-radiotherapy in 28.2%, and surgery in 18.4% of the pts. Chemotherapy was mostly platin based doubles including etoposide (14.9%), paclitaxel (14.0%), gemcitabine (12.3%), docetaxol (4.3%), pemetrexed (2.2%), vinorelbin (4.9%), and others. The use of targeted therapies was detected in 1.1% of the pts. Palliative radiotherapy was given in 21.1% of the pts (8.5% brain, 7.2% bone, 6.7% thorax, and others). Interventional bronchoscopy or bronchial stenting was performed in 2.0% and pleurodesis in 1.8%. Of the pts, 10.5% reported the use of herbal medicine products. Most pts with lung cancer presented in advanced stages and only 18.4% had a chance for surgery. Conventional chemotherapy and radiotherapy was the most common therapeutic options but the use of targeted therapies and interventional procedures seems to be quite low.