Study Details

People who have small cell lung cancer are usually treated with chemotherapy. Although this works to keep the cancer at bay for a while, for most people the cancer will come back eventually and they will die. Doctors try to increase the amount of chemotherapy given, to try to ensure that the cancer is controlled. But this is very difficult, because the blood cells take time to recover after each chemotherapy treatment.

A drug called human granulocyte colony stimulating factor (G-CSF) can help the blood cells recover more quickly. If this worked for people with small cell lung cancer, it would mean that chemotherapy could be given more often, thus giving people a chance of living longer.

The LU19 trial aimed to test whether giving G-CSF alongside chemotherapy would help people with this type of cancer to live longer.

403 patients from centres across the UK were randomised into two groups. People in the first group were given the usual treatment – chemotherapy every 3 weeks. People in the second group were given chemotherapy every 2 weeks. They were also given G-CSF.

This trial recruited patients between 1993 and 1996. A report of this trial was published in 2000.

This trial was funded by the Medical Research Council. The G-CSF was donated by the pharmaceutical company Chugai-Rhone-Poulence.

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