Stage III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is a heterogeneous disease requiring a multi-modal management approach. We conducted a real-world, global study to characterise patients, treatment patterns, and their associated clinical outcomes for stage III NSCLC.
KINDLE was a retrospective study in patients with stage III NSCLC (American Joint Committee on Cancer, 7 edition) diagnosed between January 2013 and December 2017, with at least nine months of documented follow-up since index diagnosis. In addition to descriptive statistics, Kaplan-Meier methodology evaluated survival estimates; two-sided 95% confidence interval (CI) intervals were computed. Cox proportional hazard model was used for univariate and multi-variate analyses.
A total of 3151 patients from more than 100 centres across 19 countries from Asia, Middle East and Africa, and Latin America were enrolled. Median age was 63.0 years (range 21.0-92.0); 76.5% were males, 69.2% had a smoking history, 53.7% had adenocarcinoma and 21.4% underwent curative resection. Of >25 treatment regimens, concurrent chemoradiotherapy (cCRT) was the most common (29.4%). The overall median progression-free survival (mPFS; 95% CI) and median overall survival (mOS) were 12.5 months (12.06-13.14) and 34.9 months (32.00-38.01), respectively. Significant associations (p<0.05) were observed for mPFS and mOS with respect to gender, region, smoking status, stage, histology, and Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) status. In univariate and multi-variate analyses, younger age, stage IIIA, better ECOG status, cCRT, and surgery as initial therapy predicted better mOS.
KINDLE reveals the diversity in treatment practices and outcomes in stage III NSCLC in a real-world setting in the pre-immuno-oncology era. There is a high unmet medical need, necessitating novel approaches to optimise outcomes.

Copyright © 2021. Published by Elsevier Inc.

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