[Surgical treatment of brain metastases from non-microcellular lung cancer]

A retrospective analysis is reported of 185 patients treated at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, in whom in the period 1984-1989 metastases to the brain from non-microcellular lung cancer were removed surgically. The statistical analysis was done by the Kaplan-Meier test. For neurosurgical treatment patients should be qualified without metastases to other organs and with brain metastatic tumor accessible for operation. The median survival was 12 months after operation on the brain, and 27 months after thoracic operation. The patients with cerebellar metastases had the same survival time after the operation as those with supratentorial metastases. Radiotherapy had no influence on the length of survival after tumor removal. Recurrence of brain tumour occurred in half the cases. Reoperation in case of recurrence prolonged the survival by another 10 months.