Specialized Radiation Therapy and Chemotherapy in Treating Patients With Stage III Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer That Cannot Be Removed by Surgery

PRIMARY OBJECTIVES:

I. To determine the maximum-tolerable radiotherapy (RT) dose fraction for accelerated hypofractionated radiotherapy with concurrent chemotherapy.

SECONDARY OBJECTIVES:

I. To evaluate the rate of radiographic response to treatment. II. To estimate the rates of progression: local/regional/distant. III. To estimate the progression-free survival. IV. To estimate the overall survival.

OUTLINE: This is a dose-escalation study of accelerated hypofractionated radiotherapy.

CONCURRENT THERAPY: Patients receive paclitaxel IV over 1 hour and carboplatin IV over 30-60 minutes on days 1 and 8. Treatment repeats every 14 days for 2 courses in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity. Patients also undergo accelerated hypofractionated radiotherapy using 3-dimensional conformal radiation therapy or intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) once daily, 5 days a week, for approximately 4-5.5 weeks.

CONSOLIDATION THERAPY: Beginning 4 weeks after completion of radiotherapy, patients receive paclitaxel IV over 3 hours and carboplatin IV over 30-60 minutes on day 1. Treatment repeats every 21 days for 2 courses in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.

After completion of study treatment, patients are followed up at 1 month, every 3 months for 2 years, and then every 6 months for 3 years.

• Histologically or cytologically documented non-small cell lung cancer
• Stage IIIA or IIIB non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) per American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) version 7; patients who present with N2 or N3 disease and an undetectable primary tumor are also eligible
• Thoracic disease without supraclavicular or contralateral hilar involvement
• When pleural fluid is visible on both computed tomography (CT) scan and on a chest x-ray, a pleuracentesis is required to confirm that the pleural fluid is cytologically negative; exudative pleural effusions are excluded regardless of cytology; patients with effusions that are minimal (i.e., not visible on chest x-ray) and too small to safely tap are eligible
• No prior radiotherapy or chemotherapy for NSCLC
• No prior mediastinal or thoracic radiotherapy
• Patients with complete surgical resection of disease are not eligible, however; patients with surgical resection and measurable gross residual disease present on imaging are considered eligible
• Patients must have measurable disease

• Lesions that can be accurately measured in at least one dimension (longest diameter to be recorded) as >= 2 cm with conventional techniques or as >= 1 cm with spiral CT scan
• Patients with non-measurable disease are not eligible; all other lesions, including small lesions (longest diameter < 20 mm with conventional techniques or < 10 mm with spiral CT scan) and truly nonmeasurable lesions; lesions that are considered non-measurable include the following:

• Bone lesions
• Leptomeningeal disease
• Ascites
• Pleural/pericardial effusion
• Inflammatory breast disease
• Lymphangitis cutis/pulmonis
• Abdominal masses that are not confirmed and followed by imaging techniques
• Cystic lesions
• Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) performance status 0-1
• No patients that are known to be pregnant or nursing
• Granulocytes ≥ 1,500/μl Platelet count ≥ 100,000/μl Bilirubin ≤ 1.5 times upper limit of normal (ULN) Aspartate aminotransferase (AST) (serum glutamic oxalo-acetic transaminase [SGOT]) ≤ 2.0 times ULN Serum creatinine ≤ 1.5 times ULN OR calculated creatinine clearance >= 70 mL/min FEV-1 ≥ 1.2 L/sec or 50% predicted