[Assessment of surgery for patients older than 75 years of age with lung cancer].

We have studied the surgical outcome in 2 groups of patients: those older than 75 years of age (group A, n=56) and those younger than 74 years of age (group B, n=162). Operative and histological type were similar in both groups. Postoperative complication in group A were air leak lasting more than 7 days (23.2%) and empyema (7.1%). Hospital mortality for group A was 1.8%, and for group B was 1.2%. The overall long-term survival at 5 years was 71.4% for group A and 67.3% for group B, which showed no significant differences between 2 groups. We concluded that elderly patients can undergo surgical treatment with an expectation of operative outcome similar to younger patients. Patients should not be denied operation on the basis of age alone.