Sublobar minimally invasive surgery vs. stereotactic ablative radiotherapy for early stage non-small cell lung cancer

Abstract

Although lobectomy has been traditionally considered the standard treatment for early stage non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), lung-sparing resections usually called “sublobar resections” have exponentially increased in their use in the age of minimally-invasive surgery. Sublobar resection, especially anatomical segmentectomy, has shown comparable oncological outcomes in tumors less than 2 cm in diameter without nodal involvement and distant metastasis. On the other hand, more advanced radiation techniques such as stereotactic ablative radiotherapy, have shown excellent local control rates in stage I NSCLC, with low rates of post-treatment complications, so not only is its role growing in inoperable patients, but also in standard-risk stage I patients. There is a need for multicenter randomized trials addressing specifically this issue. This review aims to collect comparative data about the outcomes of both treatment strategies in early stage NSCLC.

Keywords

Thoracic surgery / video-assisted / stereotactic radiation therapy / lung neoplasms

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