Efficacy of neoadjuvant therapy for lung squamous cell carcinoma and lung adenocarcinoma: A retrospective comparative study

Preoperative neoadjuvant therapy is widely used in cancer treatment; however, its efficacy in different subtypes of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is unknown. The present study compared the clinical efficacy of preoperative neoadjuvant therapy for two major NSCLC subtypes. Patients with NSCLC who underwent preoperative neoadjuvant therapy between January 2016 and August 2022 were reviewed. Patients were stratified according to histology and treatment strategy. Retrospective analysis was performed by comparing the basic clinical characteristics of the patients, clinicopathological characteristics of the tumors, imaging data and pathological responses to treatment. A total of 36 cases of lung squamous cell carcinoma (LUSC) and 31 cases of lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) were included. After neoadjuvant chemotherapy combined with immunotherapy, the pathological response rates were higher for patients with LUSC than LUAD, but there was no statistically significant difference between the two subgroups (P=0.06). However, the pathological complete response rates after neoadjuvant chemotherapy combined with immunotherapy were significantly higher for LUSC than those after chemotherapy alone (P=0.01). These preliminary findings suggested that preoperative chemotherapy combined with immunotherapy could improve the pathological response of patients, particularly in those with LUSC. The present study provided new insights into the treatment of NSCLC.