How Can Radiotherapy Tackle Lung Cancer In Non-Smokers?

The use of private radiotherapy has proved invaluable in treating a myriad of different types of cancer over the years. What was originally no more than a palliative treatment can now greatly extend life or even fully cure a wide range of cancers.

Among the many changes to cancer care have been a growing understanding of how radiation works, improved scanning and diagnosis, as well as enhanced technology to provide doses in a more optimal way, all leading to better patient outcomes.

At the same time, however, the types of cancer being treated have varied and will continue to do so. Some have become less common, while others have increased in frequency.

Why Do Some Non-Smokers Get Lung Cancer?

However, while lung cancer is commonly associated with smoking, it is not always the case that a sufferer is a current or even past smoker. There is a rising tide of lung cancer among non-smokers that requires its own approach to diagnostics, risk assessment and treatment.

A non-smoker may suffer the disease because of extensive passive smoking by being in a smoky environment, but, increasingly, these situations are rare outside the homes of smokers, as many countries have banned smoking indoors in public places.

However, as the European Medical Journal (EMJ) has highlighted, there is a specific group whose lung cancers owe nothing to smoking.

Those who tend to be affected by this form of lung cancer are more likely to have the following characteristics:

• Women
• Asian
• Genetic vulnerabilities and mutations that increase the influence of factors such as air pollution and inflammatory conditions

Because these do not correlate closely with the people commonly associated with a high risk of lung cancer, in particular, the lack of a smoking habit, the journal noted that this means an early diagnosis is more likely to be missed.

This means it is more likely that patients will need radiotherapy for secondary cancer as metastasis will have had more time to take place, while for some, only palliative options remain. As with all cancers, early diagnosis improves the patient’s prospects.

However, efforts to increase knowledge of this condition may themselves aid an improvement in patient outcomes by producing greater awareness and with it more early diagnoses.

How Does Radiotherapy Tackle Lung Cancer?

Once a diagnosis has been made, the question of what role radiotherapy may play in treatment comes next.

As the EMJ article noted, the genetic predisposition that increases the vulnerability of some to non-smoker lung cancer, with the “high rate of targetable mutations and distinct immune features”, makes the use of targeted therapy drugs a part of many treatment programmes.

However, treatment courses are not always a matter of either/or treatment options, with different methods of fighting cancer being used in tandem.

Indeed, studies have shown that radiotherapy can often be used in concert with other therapies and may even make them more effective.

Lung cancer is classified in two ways – small cell (SCLC) and non-small cell (NSCLC), but both can be treated using radiotherapy. Non-smokers with lung cancer are more likely to suffer NSCLC, which accounts for more than eight out of ten lung cancer cases.

How Is Radiotherapy Used According To Different Lung Cancer Types?

In the case of NSCLC, surgery is often the first resort, as the larger cells make them an easier target for surgeons to seek to excise tumours and cells. Radiotherapy is then given afterwards, which aims to tackle remaining cells or any parts of tumours still present.

This form of radiotherapy is known as adjuvant radiotherapy, whereas stereotactic ablative radiotherapy is a type of precisely-targeted radiotherapy used instead of surgery for NSCLC.

In SCLC cases, radiotherapy and chemotherapy are both commonly used. In different cases, radiotherapy may be given before, after, or alongside chemotherapy.

These variations in cancer type and different treatment approaches highlight how important it is to treat every patient as an individual. This becomes even more important in the case of a non-smoker with lung cancer.

It may be an unusual form of the disease, but we will be ready to respond by providing the right treatment, aiming to give you or your loved one the best possible outcome.

Learn more about our advanced radiotherapy treatments for lung cancer on the Amethyst Group website.