Managing patients with lung cancer

摘要

Lung cancer is the commonest cancer in the United Kingdom and also the commonest cause of death from cancer, with around 37 000 deaths each year. Despite this, it remains the Cinderella of common solid tumours, and because most patients are elderly and eventually succumb to the disease the management of patients is often afflicted by an unjustified sense of therapeutic nihilism. Both within and between countries there is greater variation in clinical practice and outcomes for patients with lung cancer than can be justified by factors such as case mix alone, suggesting that clinicians use different information to inform treatment decisions.