Experts have hailed a ‘quantum leap’ forward in lung cancer treatment, thanks to a new double-drug therapy that can reduce the risk of relapse and boost survival by years.
Trial results announced this month showed that patients given the immunotherapy medicine nivolumab alongside chemotherapy prior to surgery were more likely to live longer, compared to those given chemo alone.
Sufferers also remained symptom-free for nearly a year longer after completing treatment.
Nivolumab is already available on the NHS for lung cancer patients, but is given after surgery or chemo. Doctors believe the trial findings will set a new standard in care for patients.
Consultant oncologist Tobias Arkenau, of the Sarah Cannon Research Institute UK, said: ‘New approaches like these have transformed lung cancer from something that was basically untreatable to a chronic disease.
'The days of only being able to offer chemotherapy, and a fairly bleak prognosis, are pretty much gone.
And with nivolumab, there is even the hope of a cure. It’s a ground-breaking trial and life-changing for cancer patients.’
One patient who has first-hand experience of the remarkable effects of nivolumab is Norma McAra, 70. The grandmother- of-three from Arbroath (right) was first diagnosed with advanced lung cancer in 2013
Speaking at the American Association for Cancer Research conference a fortnight ago, oncologist Dr David Carbone, of the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center in Columbus, called the results ‘another quantum leap in lung cancer therapy’.
He added: ‘Combining immunotherapy with surgery, I think, is the new standard of care and will almost certainly improve overall survival in early-stage disease, for the first time in decades.’
Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer death in the UK, accounting for around a fifth of all deaths from the disease.
There are 50,000 new cases a year – and 60 per cent of patients die within a year of diagnosis. Just one in five men, and one in five women with lung cancer live for more than five years.
For those in the early stages of the disease, surgery is typically offered to remove a portion of the lung – and tumour within – in the hope of a cure.
This is normally followed by chemotherapy to kill off any cancer cells that have spread elsewhere in the body, to stop the cancer coming back.
But between a third and a half of patients who undergo surgery have a recurrence and ultimately die of their disease.
During the trial, 358 patients were split into two groups. Both
