Dramatic response to immunochemotherapy followed by salvage surgery in an elderly lung cancer patient

Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have caused a paradigm shift in the treatment of lung cancer. Here, we encountered a case of inoperable locally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the lung that became operable with pembrolizumab-based immunochemotherapy and achieved a pathological complete response. An 82-year-old man suspected of having lung cancer was referred to our hospital. The patient was clinically diagnosed with left upper lobe squamous cell carcinoma cT2aN3M0 c-stage IIIC. Immunostaining revealed the expression of programmed death-ligand 1 in 60% of tumor cells. The cancer cells disappeared after two cycles of chemotherapy with carboplatin and nanoparticle albumin-bound paclitaxel plus pembrolizumab. As the abnormal accumulation of ¹⁸ F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) on FDG-positron emission tomography/computed tomography before chemotherapy almost disappeared after pembrolizumab-based immunochemotherapy, left upper lobectomy and lymph node dissection were performed. No cancer cells were pathologically detected from the resected tissue. Therefore, ICIs combined with chemotherapy may enable inoperable advanced lung cancer patients to undergo surgery and achieve a complete response.