Stereotactic Ablative Radiotherapy for Localized Non–Small-Cell Lung Cancer

Localized non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) often is detected inadvertently when patients undergo computed tomography (CT) scanning for unrelated conditions; identification of such cancers undoubtedly will become more common because of recent guidelines that endorse CT screening for lung cancer (NEJM JW Gen Med Jan 28 2014). Best management of localized NSCLC in older patients with serious comorbidities is a common conundrum. One option is targeted stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR), which has fewer adverse effects than surgical resection. In this retrospective study, researchers at MD Anderson Cancer Center used the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER)-Medicare database to compare outcomes of SABR and surgery. They ide…