For our 12th video in the GRACE Spanish Lung Cancer Library, Brian Hunis, MD joined GRACE to discuss what a PET scan is.

Dr. David Harpole, Duke University Medical Center, details the methods thoracic surgeons use to assess a patient's fitness for surgery.

Dr. Gerard Silvestri, Medical University of South Carolina, describes the steps necessary to work up a lung cancer diagnosis, from initial scan to choice of treatment.

Dr. Gerard Silvestri, Medical University of South Carolina, discusses the use of PET scans in lung cancer workup.

Here's the first of two podcasts from a webinar featuring expert thoracic surgeon Dr. David Harpole from Duke University.

Here are the 5 presentations at ASCO in stage I-III NSCLC and small cell lung cancer that I think are most interesting and relevant.  You'll note that several are "negative" trials -- blockbusters are hard to come by here -- but even trials that tell us what not to do are important.   And there are some hints of new approaches that could improve outcomes for patients.

Over three and a half years ago, I wrote a post about about early work looking at the possibility that a PET scan done anywhere from three days to a month out from the start of a new systemic therapy (chemo or EGFR inhibitor) for advanced NSCLC could be predictive of a good outcome or not.

A radiologist, the person who specializes in reviewing imaging studies in medicine, is often someone you notice if they're unusually bad or unusually good. They perform a service and you presume that they're good at it, but a few are so sharp that the other doctors they work with notice it at every tumor board discussion or one on one exchange.

This is the first of the presentations by guest speakers at our NSCLC Patient Education Forum back in September. Dr. Gerard Silvestri is a pulmonologist, a lung disease specialist (not only cancer), and he is also one of the most important leaders in lung cancer within the field of pulmonology, as both a writer of some very important work and as a great speaker.