Fighting to reduce lung cancer 04. Feb. 2025

- Lung cancer is responsible for about a third of all cancer deaths in the country. At the University of Debrecen Clinical Centre, we would like to change this sad statistic with the help of our colleagues from the Pulmonology Clinic. We organised our Together against Lung Cancer event to share the latest results and information about the disease with the largest possible number of colleagues. Our aim is also to speed up the reduction of the risk of the disease," Ildikó Horváth, Professor and Director of the Pulmonology Clinic at the University of Debrecen Clinical Centre, told hirek.unideb.hu.

Ildikó Horváth added that patients usually see a specialist late, so the disease is diagnosed at an advanced stage of the tumour, when the tumour is already large and metastasises to lymph nodes and other organs outside the lungs. Treatment options are limited and relatively ineffective. Screening is of particular importance because early-stage (I, II, IIIA) lung cancer can be treated much more effectively than advanced metastatic tumours. In these cases, the tumour can often be completely removed and the patient can be made tumour-free.  This means that patients can expect a significantly longer survival with a better quality of life. 

International guidelines recommend chest screening using low-dose computed tomography (LDCT) for people at highest risk of lung cancer. For them, LDCT screening is recommended annually. 

- Those most at risk are elderly people who smoke heavily. Specifically, screening is recommended for people aged 50-75 years who are heavy smokers (have smoked at least one pack of cigarettes a day for 20 years and have quit within less than 15 years or are still smoking at the time of screening). For smokers, a mandatory element of screening is smoking cessation promotion. This not only allows the early detection of lung cancer using CT, but also reduces clients’ risk if they manage to quit smoking," stressed the Director of the Pulmonology Clinic of the University of Debrecen Clinical Centre.

At the University of Debrecen, state-of-the-art diagnostics are fully available. Examination tools include imaging (HRCT, PET-CT, MR, possibly ultrasound), pathology (histology, detection of mutations in the tumour). All treatment options are also available. The thoracic surgery and radiotherapy teams are excellent. The Pulmonology Clinic is also involved in a number of clinical trials to ensure that drug molecules still in development are available early to patients treated here. Treatments are managed by highly experienced specialists in pulmonary medicine and oncology.

- New drugs (targeted therapies and immunotherapies) can provide significantly better therapeutic outcomes for a narrower group of patients compared to chemotherapies. Some of our patients have been coming back for treatment for over five years. Ten years ago, this was almost only the case for patients who had undergone surgical removal of the tumour," said Ildikó Horváth.

The latest therapeutic and diagnostic options were presented by staff from the Department of Pulmonology Clinic, the Oncology Clinic, the Institute of Public Health and Epidemiology and the Hungarian Cancer League at the World Cancer Day symposium entitled Together against Lung Cancer.  

Press Centre - CzA