TURKISH JOURNAL OF ONCOLOGY 2009 , Vol 24 , Num 2
Evaluation of prognostic factors on survival in non-small-cell lung cancer patients treated with postoperative radiotherapy
Süreyya SARIHAN1, Cengiz GEBİTEKİN2, Ahmet Sami BAYRAM2, İlker ERCAN3, Türkkan EVRENSEL4, Elif Ülker AKYILDIZ5
1Uludağ Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Radyasyon Onkolojisi Anabilim Dalı, Bursa
2Uludağ Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Göğüs Cerrahisi Anabilim Dalı, Bursa
3Uludağ Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Biyoistatistik Anabilim Dalı, Bursa
4Uludağ Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Medikal Onkoloji Bilim Dalı, Bursa
5Uludağ Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Patoloji Anabilim Dalı, Bursa
OBJECTIVES
To investigate the prognostic factors on survival in nonsmall-cell lung cancer patients treated with postoperative radiotherapy.

METHODS
Sixty-five patients treated with a median dose of 59 Gy (50-66.6 Gy) between October 1995 and January 2005 were included in the study. Clinical and categorical variables were analyzed.

RESULTS
On multivariate analysis, presence of clinical N2 and brain metastasis at first relapse and absence of chemotherapy (p=0.02, p=0.004, p=0.004) had a negative impact on overall survival, while presence of pathological nodal involvement and absence of chemotherapy (p=0.02, p=0.04) were effective on disease-free survival. Regarding categorical variables, type of resection was found related with positive margin and N1, right-sided location with N1-e and N2, and systematic nodal dissection with N1. The number of involved lymph nodes was found related with N2 skip metastasis and involved N1-10 was related with N1-e.

CONCLUSION
Presence of metastatic lymph nodes was found to be a poor prognostic factor and delivery of chemotherapy was seen to positively affect overall and disease-free survival rates. Keywords : Non-small-cell lung cancer; postoperative radiotherapy; prognostic factors; survival