Multimodality Treatment With Surgery for Locally Advanced Non–Small-Cell Lung Cancer With N2 Disease: A Review Article

Stage III non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is composed of a heterogeneous population of lesions (ie, T4N0-3, T3N1-3, and T1a-2aN2-3), which makes it difficult to establish a definitive treatment strategy. Although several retrospective and prospective studies have been conducted to investigate the significance of multimodality treatments with surgery for patients with resectable stage III NSCLC, the role of surgery still remains controversial. In this article, we review the results of retrospective and prospective studies that have investigated the significance of multimodality treatment with surgery for patients with stage III NSCLC, particularly those with mediastinal lymph node metastasis, and the implications for the treatment of this controversial subset of patients.