Surgical adjuvant therapy for stage II and stage III adenocarcinoma and large-cell undifferentiated carcinoma.

Abstract

The Lung Cancer Study Group randomized 141 patients with resected stage II and III adenocarcinoma and large-cell undifferentiated carcinoma to receive postoperative Cytoxan (Bristol-Meyers, Syracuse, NY), Adriamycin (Adria Laboratories, Columbus, Ohio), and cisplatin (CAP) chemotherapy or bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) and levamisole immunotherapy. Careful intraoperative staging was performed on all patients. Before randomization, patients were stratified by stage, weight loss, cardiac arrhythmia, and institution. Prognostic variables such as stage, age, weight loss, and nodal involvement were equally distributed between the two groups. Disease-free survival was significantly prolonged in the group receiving chemotherapy. There was no evidence of a deleterious effect of the immunotherapy. This study indicates that postoperative CAP chemotherapy is effective in prolonging disease-free survival in these patients.