Primary lung cancer: characterization and survival of 1024 patients treated in a single institution.

This report describes the presenting features, smoking history, diagnostic techniques and their yields, histological typing and tumor-node-metastases (TNM) staging for a cohort of 1024 Australian patients with primary lung cancer. It also includes survival data for the group as a whole and for subgroups of patients based on clinical stage, histology, treatment modality and postsurgical stage. Ninety-six per cent of patients had smoked. A much higher proportion of patients with adenocarcinoma had smoked than has commonly been believed. In surgically treated patients, stage, but not histological type or age, was related to survival. Approximately one-third of all patients had such advanced disease that no treatment to the primary site was offered.