PURPOSE:
The aim of this study was to investigate
epidemiology, clinical characteristics and
sex differences of
patients with
lung cancer using nationwide
registry in
Korea. MATERIALS AND
METHODS:
The Korean
Association for
Lung Cancer developed a
registry in cooperation with the Korean Central
Cancer Registry, and surveyed about 10% of
lung cancer cases. For this first
survey of cases diagnosed in 2014, cases were selected through a systematic sampling
method.
RESULTS:
Total 2,621
lung cancer patients were surveyed, and the median
patient age was 70 years. During the study period,
adenocarcinoma was the most frequent histologic type, the proportion of
female patients was 28.4%, and
women had a better
prognosis (median
survival, not reached vs. 13 months; p<0.001) than did
men for
non-small cell lung cancer. The proportion of never-
smokers was 36.4%, and never-
smoking was more prevalent in
women than in
men (87.5 vs. 16.0%, p<0.001).
Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)
mutations were found in 36.8% of stage IV
adenocarcinoma patients, and higher in
female compared to
male patients (51.2 vs. 26.6%, p<0.001). In addition,
patients with EGFR
mutation showed better
survival (median
survival, 18 vs. 8 months; p<0.001) than
patients without EGFR
mutation in these
patients.
CONCLUSION:
This is the first
survey to gather unbiased nationwide
lung cancer statistics in
Korea. More than one-third of
lung cancer patients had no
smoking history.
Female had a high proportion of
non-smoker, more
adenocarcinoma with EGFR
mutation and generally better
prognosis than
male.