Minimum Dose Computed Tomography of the Thorax for Follow-up in Patients With Resected Lung Carcinoma

University Health Network, Toronto

Status and phase: Completed; Phase 2

Conditions: Non-small Cell Lung Cancer

Treatments: Procedure: Minimum Dose Computed Tomography (MnDCT) scan

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT00188279

05-0051-C

Details and patient eligibility

About

This study is designed to help decide whether a CAT scan performed at a very low dose of radiation (Minimum dose CT scan) is better than a Chest X-Ray in detecting recurrence of lung cancer in the chest (after surgery).

Full description

Lung Carcinoma is expected to kill 18,900 men and women in Canada in 2004. This is more than the combined total for the next three common cancers. The most important factor that determines patient survival is the stage of disease at presentation. Surgical resection is the best chance of cure. However, patients who undergo lung resection with curative intent have a significant incidence of a second lung cancer at 2% per year and a recurrence rate of 38% at 5 years. The current follow-up of these patients relies on periodic physical examination and chest radiography(CXR). However, CXR is insensitive in the detection of lung nodules when compared to standard Computed Tomography of the thorax (SDCT). Computed Tomography detects smaller lung nodules than CXR however, the radiation dose from a SDCT is roughly equivalent to 20 CXR examinations. Screening studies using Low Dose CT of the Thorax (LDCT) in subjects at high risk for lung cancer have demonstrated that LDCT detects three times as many nodules as CXR and four times as many primary lung cancers at one-third the dose of SDCT. Phantom and clinical work with LDCT performed at UHN/MSH suggests that a further reduction in radiation dose (Minimum Dose CT -MnDCT) is possible for nodule detection. Minimum dose CT is performed at a dose one sixth of a SDCT.In addition, if MnDCT is confirmed to be a more sensitive nodule detection technique, it could be used to

1. Increase the interval between repeat out-patient assessment and thereby 2. Reduce the overall cost of surveillance and inconvenience to the patient and 3. Free up clinic time for the surgeon to review more patients and reduce waiting lists

Enrollment: 311 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• lung cancer patients undergoing resection with intent to cure

Exclusion criteria

• age < 18 years

Trial design

Primary purpose: Diagnostic

Allocation: N/A

Interventional model: Single Group Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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311 participants in 1 patient group

MnDCT

Experimental group

Treatment:

Procedure: Minimum Dose Computed Tomography (MnDCT) scan