Survival of Patients With True Pathologic Stage I Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer

When patients with NCSLC are accurately staged preoperatively and undergo complete thoracic lymphadenectomy, the 5-year survival is 80% for (p)stage IA tumors and 87% for (c)stage I disease. About 32% of patients are under-staged (most commonly from nonimaged N2 disease) despite the liberal application of all of the techniques that assess mediastinal lymph nodes preoperatively. Thus surgical intervention offers improved staging with resection of unsuspected nodal or parenchymal disease. If stereotactic radiation and radiofrequency ablation are considered for patients with clinically staged I NSCLC, these results should be considered.