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

The new, 7th Edition of the TNM (tumor, nodes, metastases) staging system for lung cancer came into use earlier this year and has led to changes in the staging of about 15% of lung cancers compared with what they'd have been staged as under the 6th edition.

The medical literature tells us that one of the most stressful times of a patients' cancer course is the time between discovering that they may have cancer and beginning their treatment. So much is new and unknown. For many patients, this is their first exposure to the health care system. The patient often requires multiple tests and need to consult with different physician specialties, sometimes in different hospitals before treatment can begin. It can be a time where well meaning family and friends provide advice and anecdotes from their experiences with cancer.

I'm very happy to present an audio interview with Dr. Eric Vallières, an excellent thoracic surgeon and Surgical Director of the Lung Cancer Program at Swedish Cancer Institute. Within the lung cancer community, he actually happens to be among the most well known thoracic surgeons in the country and even world, and he has a major expertise in the integration of chemotherapy and other systemic therapies for early stage lung cancer.