title: Adjuvant chemo-immunotherapy after curative resection of Stage II and IIIA primary lung cancer.
abstract: Out of 642 primary lung cancer patients who underwent surgery between 1986 and 1992, 82 cases who underwent curative resection were enrolled for a randomized prospective controlled study of postsurgical adjuvant immunotherapy using Interleukin 2 (IL-2) and lymphokine activated killer (LAK) cells. From 1986 to 1989 (the initial period), Stage IIIA patients were divided into three groups: group A (chemo-immunotherapy) received IL-2, LAK cell adoptive immunotherapy after two courses of anticancer (CDDP, VDS, MMC) chemotherapy, group B (control) received no adjuvant therapy, and group C (chemotherapy) received the same anticancer chemotherapy as group A. In the latter (1990-1992) period, group C was discontinued because of poor results and Stage II and IIIA cases were randomly assigned to group A or B. The 5- and 7-year survival rates of group A (33 cases) and B (36 cases) were 58.2% and 31.5%, respectively in Stage II and IIIA cases. The prognosis of group A was significantly better than that of group B (P = 0.0038 by the Cox-Mantel (C-M) test and 0.0033 by the generalized Wilcoxon (G-W) test). The 5- and 8-year survival rates of each group for Stage IIIA cases were 53.4% (group A, 25 cases), 33.4% (group B, 26 cases), and 30.8%, 15.3% (group C, 13 cases). The prognosis of group A was significantly better than that of group B (P = 0.045 by the C-M and 0.036 by the G-W test). The difference between group A and B was also significant in N0, N1 (P < 0.01), in T1, T2 (P < 0.01), and T3 (P < 0.05) cases. These results indicate that adjuvant immunotherapy using IL-2 and LAK cells in combination with chemotherapy is significantly effective in improving the postsurgical prognosis of lung cancer patients.
authors.affiliation: Division of Thoracic Diseases, Chiba Cancer Center, Japan.
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Kimura
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yamaguchi
mesh_terms: D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000601:surgery / Q000628:therapy*; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000971:Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D017024:Chemotherapy, Adjuvant; D002945:Cisplatin / Q000008:administration & dosage; D003131:Combined Modality Therapy; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D016219:Immunotherapy, Adoptive; D007376:Interleukin-2 / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D015979:Killer Cells, Lymphokine-Activated; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000601:surgery / Q000628:therapy*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016685:Mitomycin / Q000008:administration & dosage; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011446:Prospective Studies; D014751:Vindesine / Q000008:administration & dosage
chemical_list: D007376:Interleukin-2; D016685:Mitomycin; D002945:Cisplatin; D014751:Vindesine