The importance of surgery as the first step in multimodality treatment of small cell bronchial carcinoma. The ISC Lung Cancer Study Group.

For patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC) in their early stages (TNM I, II), surgery for cure was used to eliminate the primary tumour and its regional lymph-nodes followed by intermittent chemotherapy and radiotherapy within the first six postoperative months. After the pathohistological examination of the operation-specimen a two-arm-randomization was performed: standard chemotherapy (1000 mg/m2 cyclophosphamide, 50 mg/m2 doxorubicin, 1.4 mg/m2 vincristine) compared with sequential chemotherapy using three different drug-combinations (A: 1500 mg/m2 cyclophosphamide, 100 mg/m2 lomustine, 15 mg/m2 methotrexate; B: 1000 mg/m2 cyclophosphamide, 40 mg/m2 doxorubicin, 1 mg/m2 vincristine; C: 5 x 1.6 g/m2 ifosfamide plus mesna, 5 x 120 mg/m2 etopside). Thereafter disease-free patients only received prophylactic cranial irradiation (PCI: administering 3600 TD Gy/18 fractions) according to the protocols of the International Society of Chemotherapy Studies I and II. Preliminary evaluations in March 1990 of 170 patients from 24 cooperating departments for thoracic surgery showed that the projected life-table four-year-survival rate of 63 patients with SCLC at pTNM-stage I was 61%, of 54 patients at pTNM-stage II was 35%, of 13 patients at stage pT3, 4 NO, 1 MO was 59% and of 40 patients at stage pT N2 MO was 35%. The indication for surgery is emphasized for pTNM-stages I + II. For N2-lesions surgery would not be recommended in general, but the survival rate seems to indicate that this treatment was not detrimental, being rather more favourable compared with chemotherapy or radiotherapy alone. The continuation and enlargement of these studies seem not only justified, but emphatically indicated.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)