Table 1.

The differences in the clinical features, treatment methods and prognostic factors for C-SCLC compared with pure SCLC

	Pure SCLC	C-SCLC
Clinical features
Location	Overwhelming majority central sites	About half were peripheral, especially pleural effusion
Stage	About 40% limited stage	About 70% limited stage
	About 5% I–II stage	About 30% I–II stage
Treatment
Surgery	Little benefit	More benefit
Chemotherapy	Sensitive	Lower sensitive
Radiotherapy	Sensitive	Lower sensitive
EGFR-TKI	Less effective	Potential effective
Prognostic factors		Receive surgery, limited disease extent, good PS, right lung location, central site, combination with adenocarcinoma or spindle cell carcinoma, low NLR and normal CRP levels, and reduced RABEX-5 expression

Abbreviations: SCLC, small-cell carcinoma; C-SCLC, combined small-cell lung carcinoma; EGFR-TKI, epidermal growth factor receptor-tyrosine kinase inhibitor; PS, performance status; NLR, neutrophile-lymphocyte ratio; CRP, C-reactive protein.