Metrics details. Despite the progress seen in the last decade in diagnosis and treatment, lung cancer has still a bad prognosis and a substantial number of patients died within the weeks following diagnosis. The objective of this study was to quantify early mortality in lung cancer, to identify patients who are at high risk of early decease, and to describe their management in a real world.
Prospective observational study including consecutively all adult patients managed for primary lung cancer histologically or cytologically diagnosed in in the respiratory medicine department of one of the participating French general hospitals. Patients and cancer characteristics and first therapeutic strategy were collected at diagnosis.
All fatal cases were considered regardless of the cause of the death. Multivariate logistic regression model was used to determine the factors significantly and independently associated with death at 1 and 3 months. Seven thousand fifty-one patients from centres were included in the study. Vital status was obtained for 6, patients. Respectively, 9. As compared with the other patients, they were significantly older and frailer based on performance status [PS] and recent weight loss and more frequently reported stage IV tumour.
Overall, About one in four patients died within 3 months following lung cancer diagnosis. Early mortality mainly involves frail patients with advanced cancer and is associated with lack of cancer therapy. This supports the need for early diagnosis and clinical trials in this population. Reducing early mortality to give supplementary time to patients to organise the future is a major challenge for 21 st century physicians. Peer Review reports. Despite the progress seen in the last decade in diagnosis and treatment, lung cancer has still a bad prognosis [ 1 ].
Literature on lung cancer mortality is abundant. However, available information about early mortality is limited [ 3 ]. Most of the literature relates to treatment and usually excludes elderly, frail, and socially marginalised patients [ 3 ], or tries to identify predictors of early mortality after specific therapeutic interventions e.
