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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2011 Apr 8.
Published in final edited form as: Nat Rev Cancer. 2010 Oct 22;10(11):760–774. doi: 10.1038/nrc2947

Figure 1. Progress in the treatment of metastatic lung cancer.

Figure 1

In 1976, a chemotherapy trial studied all patients with lung cancer, regardless of whether they had small-cell lung cancer (SCLC) or non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC)3. In 2002, a landmark chemotherapy trial involving platinum doublets studied all patients with NSCLC, regardless of histological subtype (adenocarcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma and large-cell carcinoma)152. In 2006, bevacizumab (Avastin; Genentech/ Roche) was shown to confer an overall survival benefit when added to chemotherapy for patients with non-squamous NSCLC153. The smoking history of patients was not recorded. In 2009, trials in epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-mutant lung cancer with EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) demonstrated the longest survival rates currently seen for NSCLC20,21,47. Notably, patients with EGFR-mutant lung tumours also have a better prognosis in the absence of therapy compared with those with EGFR-wild-type tumours20.