Daily Dose: Lung Cancer Screening Significantly Increases Long-Term Survival Rate

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Patient Care brings primary care clinicians a lot of medical news every day—it’s easy to miss an important study. The Daily Dose provides a concise summary of one of the website's leading stories you may not have seen.

Last week, we reported on findings from a study published in the journal Radiology.

The study

Researchers conducted the study to determine the 20-year lung cancer-specific survival of persons diagnosed with first primary lung cancer through annual low-dose CT screening in the expanded International ELCAP (I-ELCAP) multicenter, global research program. In the I-ELCAP program, a total of 89 404 patients underwent lung cancer screening between 1992 and 2022.

Findings

Results demonstrated a 10-year lung cancer–specific survival rate of 81% (95% CI, 79%-84%) and a 20-year lung cancer–specific survival rate of 81% (95% CI, 78%-83%) in patients who were diagnosed with lung cancer through early CT screening. Among patients who were diagnosed with stage I disease (≤10mm), the survival rate was 95% (95% CI, 91%-98%).

Authors' comment

"The 20-year follow-up provides an estimate of the cure rate achieved in annual screening programs using a well-defined protocol and comprehensive management system, which allows for identification of early lung cancer while it is still small and curable."

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