Giving lung cancer patients radiation after surgery doesn’t help them live longer, a new study shows.
Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have found post-operative radiation therapy -- a controversial but frequently used treatment for lung cancer – to be of no benefit to older patients.
The study, published in the online edition of the journal Cancer, was based on an analysis of more than 1,300 patients treated for an advanced form of lung cancer between 1992 and 2005.
More than half of the patients received radiation treatment after their tumors were removed, but there was no difference in survival rates between those who did and did not receive it.

“While some analyses have shown improvement with [radiation], the data are not strong enough to support using it as a standard of care in older adults with this type of lung cancer,” said Dr. Juan Wisnivesky, of Mount Sinai School of Medicine and lead author of the study. “Our results show that we need more information about the potential benefits of radiation therapy before it is used routinely to treat these patients, especially considering the side effects associated with it.”