Influence of chemoradiotherapy on treatment efficacy in patients with locally advanced small cell lung cancer

The randomized unicentric study was conducted to compare the efficacy of two chemoradiotherapy regimens for 67 patients with locally advanced small cell lung cancer. Group A patients (n=33) were treated with concurrent chemoradiotherapy consisting of cisplatin 80 mg/m2 on day 1 and etoposide 120 mg/m2 on days 1 to 3 and external beam radiotherapy in fraction of 1.5 Gy twice daily until a totall dose of 60 Gy to the tumor and 44 Gy to the regional lymph nodes. Following chemoradiotherapy, chemotherapy alone was administered for 2 cycles in the same dose. Group B patients (n=34) received 2 cycles of the above chemotherapy regimen followed by external beam radiation therapy concurrently with the 3-rd and the 4-th cycles of chemotherapy. Response rates were 81.8 % and 76.5 % in Group I and Group II, respectively. No statistically significant difference was observed (p=0.61). Adverse events were observed more frequently in Group A patients than in Group B patients. The median interval between treatments was 15 days for Group A and 12 days for Group B.