Read time: 3 minutes.

This is Part 1 in a 3-part series explaining how new drugs and treatments get approved to treat lung cancer. Parts 2 and 3 will be published in the coming weeks.

Have you ever wondered how a new medicine or drug to treat lung cancer is brought to the people who need it? That’s what clinical trials help us do.

Read time: 3 minutes.  

One of LUNGevity’s two flagship survivorship events, the International Lung Cancer Survivorship Conference (ILCSC), is being held virtually September 20 – 21, 2024. This is a free, online event that allows people with lung cancer and caregivers from around the world to join from the comfort of their own homes and hear from a star-studded lineup of lung cancer experts discussing the latest advances in research and treatment.  

Read time: 2 minutes.  

Traditionally, people associate getting involved in lung cancer research with enrolling in a clinical trial. But most don’t realize they can also partner with researchers behind the scenes and get involved in designing clinical trials.  

Read time: 2 minutes

Integrative oncology adds holistic approaches—such as acupuncture, nutrition, exercise, and mindfulness—into a treatment plan. Research shows these interventions can have a tremendous impact on people going through lung cancer treatment and their quality of life. Unfortunately, they are also topics riddled with myths and falsehoods. 

LUNGevity spoke to an expert to help sort out the facts from the fiction. 

This March, LUNGevity Foundation partnered with CURE for their “Speaking Out” video series, inviting Amy Moore, PhD, vice president of global engagement and patient partnerships at LUNGevity Foundation, to discuss recent chemotherapy shortages. During the interview, Dr.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a new treatment option for people diagnosed with locally advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumors have EGFR exon 19 deletions or exon 21 L858R mutations.

Prior to this approval, treatment with osimertinib alone was the gold-standard targeted therapy for this population. The recent approval offers another option to patients – the combination of osimertinib with chemotherapy.  

In the past five years, the lung cancer community has seen an astonishing number of new treatments. As our understanding of lung cancer has deepened, the older treatment approaches have also become more effective and efficient.  

These options are fantastic steps toward improving the overall survival and quality of life for people living with lung cancer, but it can be difficult for patients and caregivers to keep track of the new drug treatments and scientific advancements.  

Asking your doctor and medical team questions about clinical trials is a helpful way to decide if they are a good fit for you. You may already have some in mind, but a few basic questions to ask and get answered before making a decision are:

The four phases of lung cancer clinical trials each serve a different and important purpose. From testing the safety of a new treatment to its effectiveness and long-term outcomes, this short video explains how researchers use clinical trials for new lung cancer treatments.

Phases of a Clinical Trial:

1. Safety of the new treatment 
2. Does the cancer respond to the treatment 
3. Is this new treatment better than the current options 
4. Studies the long-term benefits and side effects

Lung cancer clinical trials are carefully designed research studies to evaluate and learn more about new drugs and treatments. They give people the ability to participate in lung cancer research and access to new treatments that otherwise may not be available to them, all under the close supervision of medical experts.