Comparison of survival of patients with lung cancer between elderly (greater than or equal to 70) and younger (70 greater than) age groups.

Results of radiotherapy for lung cancer in the elderly were compared with those in younger patients. A total of 129 patients were treated by radiation therapy with or without chemotherapy. Fifty-six patients (43.4%) were 70 years old or more (elderly group) at the time of treatment, and the remaining 73 patients were below age 70 (younger group). Treatment results in the elderly group were nearly the same as those in the younger group in all stages of the disease. Survival time was longer for patients with performance status (PS) of 0 to 2 than for those with PS 3 or 4 regardless of age (p less than 0.05). The survival time of the elderly group was nearly the same as that of the younger group for squamous cell carcinoma, but somewhat shorter for adenocarcinoma although the difference was not statistically significant. There was no difference in survival between the two groups when they were treated by combined radiation therapy and chemotherapy. Our results suggest that elderly patients can be treated as safely as younger patients by radiotherapy alone or combined radiation therapy and chemotherapy.