An oncologist has given a survival prediction for lung cancer at different stages

The survival rate at the first stage of lung cancer is about 75%. Konstantin Laktionov, MD, professor, first deputy director of the Blokhin Oncology Center, told Izvestia on November 20, International Lung Cancer Awareness Month. N.N. Blokhin Konstantin Laktionov.

"For prediction, we use the indicator of five-year survival rate. That is, if a person after treatment has lived five years without relapses, we take him off the registry in our federal center. We can say that for stage one, the five-year survival rate is about 75%, for stage two it is 50%, and for stage three it is 25%. The fourth stage was considered incurable until recently," he said.

These figures are now being modified with the advent of innovative drugs for targeting and immunotherapy, he said.

"With the beginning of the new century, the scientific community has learned a lot about tumor biology. And with the help of molecular biological testing it is now possible to try to determine ee biological portrait. And, accordingly, identify weaknesses that we can target," the professor said.

He explained that target therapy requires a target, a weak point of the tumor. As Laktionov specified, specialists get a "high-precision weapon" that has a low spectrum of side effects because it does not touch healthy tissues.

"This is possible largely due to the fact that there are known and studied mutations of lung cancer. Today, targeted therapy is indicated for 20-22% of patients with lung adenocarcinoma, but potentially in the near future we will be able to identify mutations and administer targeted therapy to three out of four patients with adenocarcinoma," he elaborated.

In the first stage, if specialists use the entire surgical and drug arsenal available today, we can hope to increase the five-year survival rate from 75 to 85 or up to 90%, the professor emphasized.

"Immunotherapy allows the immune system's own potential to be realized. The cancerous tumor has learned to evade the immune system's 'oversight' through interactions at the receptor level. Normally, when a lymphocyte recognizes a tumor cell, it is targeted not to destroy it. But, if the tumor cell and the lymphocyte have interacted with each other through a particular receptor, the lymphocyte may be inactivated and will not secrete active substances to fight. In order to prevent these receptors from interacting with each other, an immunotherapeutic drug is administered," Laktionov explained.

With this method, the tumor evades immune "supervision" in about 25-30% of cases. The immune system has memory cells and a very powerful potential to deal with any prevalence of tumor processes, he added.

In mid-October, Olesya Startseva, a plastic surgeon and professor at the Department of Oncology, Radiotherapy and Reconstructive Surgery at Sechenov University, told Izvestia that a positive trend in recent years is the growth of early detection of breast cancer. At the same time, she noted that prevention of any cancer should start at an early age.