Lung Cancer - Recent Advances in Diagnosis and Treatment

Our plain-English summary of Lung Cancer - Recent Advances in Diagnosis and Treatment, by A. Ochsner (1969).

The study

• Author: A. Ochsner
• Published: Industrial Medicine 38(2):30-33 February (1969)
• Type of article: Journal article
• Our copy: from Johns-Manville's own medical library. The article is still under copyright, so we describe it here rather than post it.

In plain English

This article was a narrative review of lung cancer diagnosis and treatment by a surgeon at the Ochsner Clinic in New Orleans. It was presented at a railroad surgeons' conference in 1968. It did not report a formal study, and it did not mention asbestos. The author treated cigarette smoking as the main cause and called smoking history the most important diagnostic clue. The author described the clinic's experience. Colleagues found tumor cells in the peripheral arterial blood of 40% of patients with proved lung carcinoma, though this finding did not change how patients were managed. Bronchoscopy gave a positive diagnosis in only about one-third of the clinic's cases, and chest surgery was needed to make a definite diagnosis in about 10%. The author stated that removing a lobe or segment with the tumor, together with the regional lymph nodes, gave five-year survival as good as more radical operations. The author concluded that the ideal treatment was surgical removal where possible. The author also urged physicians to tell non-smokers never to start and smokers to quit.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Narrative review / lecture drawing on the author's clinical experience and published reports; not a formal study
• Who was studied: No defined study population; the author drew on patients seen at the Ochsner Clinic and Ochsner Foundation Hospital, New Orleans. The talk was presented to the Western Association of Railroad Surgeons in San Francisco, October 4, 1968.
• Exposure: Cigarette smoking, discussed as the main cause of lung cancer; asbestos is not mentioned
• Main results:
  • In routine cytologic studies at the clinic (by colleagues Hatch and Carrera), 40% of patients with proved lung carcinoma had tumor cells in their peripheral arterial blood
  • Finding tumor cells in the peripheral arterial blood did not change how the clinic managed its lung cancer patients
  • Bronchoscopy gave a positive diagnosis in about one-third of the clinic's cases
  • Thoracic exploration was needed to make a definitive diagnosis in about 10% of cases
  • The author stated that lobectomy or segmental resection with gross removal of the lesion together with the regional lymph nodes gave five-year survival as good as more radical procedures
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that surgical removal remains the ideal treatment where possible. Because most lung cancers are preventable, the author urged physicians to emphasize that non-smokers should never begin and smokers should stop completely.

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Lung Cancer, Carcinoma, Bronchoscopy.

Browse return to medical research.