The crucial role of predicting brain metastases development in non-small cell lung cancer patients

Over the past ten years we have witnessed many advances in the management of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), with the 5-year over survival (OS) in the advanced disease that has shifted to approximately 15% both in NSCLC patients with epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) + NSCLC treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) (1) and in those treated with immune-checkpoint inhibitors (ICPIs) (2) and up to approximately 50% in NSCLC patients with anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK)+ tumours following first-line crizotinib (3).