Book Description
Lung cancer is the second most common type of cancer and is the leading cause of cancer death globally. In 2018, almost 2.1 million new cases were diagnosed, accounting for ~12% of the cancer burden worldwide. The malignant stage of lung tumor is known as lung adenocarcinoma, which is most common and is diagnosed in both smokers and non-smokers.There are two main types of lung cancer, non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and small cell lung cancer (SCLC). Genomic studies have indicated that more than 80% of lung malignancies are classified as NSCLC, of which adenocarcinoma is a predominant subtype. Although significant progress has been made in treating tumor with targetable driver mutations, like EGFR mutations, most tumor do not have such mutations and the prognosis remains poor for metastasis stage patients. Platinum doublet chemotherapy has been the mainstay first-line treatment of patients who are diagnosed with metastatic lung adenocarcinoma without a targetable mutation.In recent years, immunotherapy has emerged as a treatment option that has shown strong response in a subset of patients. The immune agents block crucial checkpoints and regulate the immune response, but the tumor cells evade the patient’s immune systems. By blocking these receptor–ligand interactions, a particular subset of T cells is activated to recognize and respond to tumor cells. While such responses to immunotherapy are promising, they have only been effective in ~20% of patients.
