Radical surgical resection after neoadjuvant targeted therapy in non-small cell lung cancer: a single-center retrospective study of 6 cases

With the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) recurrence, gefitinib is the first targeted drug to be approved for advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) that failed to respond to chemotherapy (1). A great quantity studies show that gefitinib has fairly active anti-tumor activity, especially for tumors with mutations or a copy number gain of EGFR gene (2). However, there have been few data about the preoperative gefitinib treatment in NSCLC patients (3). At present, the first line treatment of patients with locally advanced NSCLC still mainly relay on neoadjuvant chemotherapy (4). While the effect of gefitinib as a neoadjuvant or preoperative therapy remains unclear (5). Preoperative neoadjuvant targeted treatment is a new departure (6).