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Would you offer SBRT as an alternative to surgery for an atypical carcinoid lung tumor?

A series of 46 patients showed excellent local control with SBRT (91% at 9 years). Should SBRT only be offered to patients formally deemed inoperable?
1 Answer
Mednet Member
Radiation Oncology · West Virginia University
Answered on

As this question pointed out, small series do show a likely benefit to SBRT for an inoperable atypical carcinoid. Two general points to make here. First, RT has been used for many years to treat atypical carcinoids when the tumor or patient characteristics don't support surgery. Second, we treat many disease conditions without the benefit of level 1 data, and in the absence of good data, we use the data we have. Lastly, I have treated atypical pulmonary carcinoid tumor with SBRT and found the tu...

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