Dr. Paul Bunn on TKIs in Advanced Lung Cancer

Paul A. Bunn, Jr, MD, professor of medicine in medical oncology, head of the division of medical oncology, University of Colorado, explains how patients with advanced-stage lung cancer benefit from tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs).

Many patients already have comorbid diseases and are very sick by the time they are diagnosed with late-stage lung cancer, Bunn says. Many of those patients are sent to hospice without any treatment or molecular testing.

Since TKIs are oral and do not have grade 3/4 life-threatening toxicities, Bunn says, patients with PS3 or patients on ICUs can see benefit from these agents.

Bunn says because of this, even sick patients who have lung cancer should have molecular testing to see if they are eligible to use TKIs.