Prognostic factors in patients with brain metastases from lung carcinoma

Between September 1980 to December 1983, 70 consecutive patients were entered into two randomly allocated trials in order to investigate the effectiveness of different time-dose radiotherapy schemes (i.e., 30 Gy/ten fractions/two weeks versus 50 Gy/20 fractions/four weeks) and the prognostic factors on the palliation for patients with brain metastases from lung carcinoma. The most important factors for predicting poor prognosis in this series, which were shown by stepwise proportional hazard (Cox) model, were lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and general performance status. In normal LDH group, the most important factors for predicting poor prognosis were multiplicity of brain metastases (p less than 0.001), treatment methods (p less than 0.0005) and age (p less than 0.0053). In high LDH group any items were not shown for meeting of the 0.05 significant level.