Stereotactic Radiation for Lung Cancer: A Practical Approach to Challenging Scenarios

Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) is an effective and well-tolerated treatment for medically inoperable patients with early stage NSCLC. SBRT is a noninvasive treatment involving the delivery of ablative radiation doses with high precision in the course of a few treatments. Relative to conventionally fractionated radiation, SBRT achieves superior local control and survival. SBRT use has increased dramatically in the past 15 years and is currently considered the standard of care in cases of inoperable early stage NSCLC. It is being increasingly applied to more complex patient populations at higher risk of treatment-related toxicity. In these more complex patients, there is an increasing need to balance patient and treatment factors in selecting the optimal patients for SBRT. Here, we review several challenging clinical scenarios often encountered in thoracic multidisciplinary tumor boards. Crown Copyright (c) 2021 Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

SBRT is an effective and well-tolerated treatment for medically inoperable early stage NSCLC patients, achieving superior local control and survival compared to conventional fractionated radiation. Its use has dramatically increased in the past 15 years and is now considered the standard of care for inoperable early stage NSCLC. Balancing patient and treatment factors is increasingly important in selecting optimal patients for SBRT, especially in more complex patient populations.