The prognosis of patients with non-small cell lung cancer found to have carcinomatous pleuritis at thoracotomy.

Non-small cell lung cancer with carcinomatous pleuritis is considered to be a contraindication of surgical resection. The objective of this study was to clarify the prognosis of patients with non-small cell lung cancer in whom carcinomatous pleuritis was found at thoracotomy. A questionnaire survey on the survival of patients with carcinomatous pleuritis found at thoracotomy between January 1985 and December 1994 was conducted by the Japan Clinical Oncology Group. According to the data collected from 21 hospitals, 8813 patients with non-small cell lung cancer underwent thoracotomy, 284 (3.2%) of whom were found to have carcinomatous pleuritis. Information on survival was available for 227 of these patients, 34 (15%) of whom underwent thoracotomy alone without resection, whereas 193 (85%) underwent surgical resection. Of the 193 resected patients, 155 had no macroscopical residual tumor apart from the carcinomatous pleuritis. The 5-year survival rate was 14%. According to a univariate analysis, female sex, the presence of adenocarcinoma, a tumor size of less than 3.0 cm, no clinical lymph node metastasis, and no macroscopical residual tumor had a significantly favorable impact on survival. A multivariate analysis revealed that the extent of clinical lymph node metastasis (P = 0.006), histology (P = 0.028), and the absence or presence of a macroscopic residual tumor after the operation (P = 0.045) were predominant prognostic factors. The 5-year survival rate of 83 patients with three positive variables was 24%. The prognosis of patients with adenocarcinoma found to have carcinomatous pleuritis at thoracotomy was not necessarily unfavorable if there was no clinically detected lymph node metastasis and no residual tumor apart from the carcinomatous pleuritis.