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Case Report
1 MBBS, Senior House Officer, Department of Radiation Oncology, Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
2 BSc, MBBS, FRANZCR, Radiation Oncologist, Department of Radiation Oncology, Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
3 BPharm, MD, FRANZCR, Radiation Oncologist, ICON Cancer Centre Greenslopes, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
Address correspondence to:
Kelleher Retchford
81 Homebush Rd, Kedron, 4031 QLD,
Australia
Message to Corresponding Author
Article ID: 100120Z10KR2023
Introduction: Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide. Squamous cell carcinomas (SCC) are responsible for a significant proportion of this burden. Spontaneous remission of cancer is a known phenomenon, albeit a rare event. The exact etiological mechanism(s) are not appreciated, although are largely predicated on the complex interactions between the malignant cells, tumor microenvironment and the immune system.
Case Report: We present the case of an incidentally found, biopsy proven lung SCC with high PD-L1 expression that underwent spontaneous regression (SR) prior to definitive therapy. The patient underwent computed tomography (CT)-guided biopsy of the lesion and coronary artery bypass grafting in the time preceding the tumor regression. The observed regression has been sustained during ongoing follow-up.
Conclusion: There are complex interactions between malignant cells, the tumor microenvironment, and the immune system, with evasion of immune destruction being a well-recognized and studied hallmark of cancer. There are multiple factors that may contribute to immune recognition of cancer and its subsequent regression and cases such as this highlight that there is much yet to elucidate. Further identification of these cases and their molecular characteristics will add to our understanding of the process. In the unknown lies the promise of improving cancer outcomes.
Keywords: Non-small cell lung cancer, PD-L1, Spontaneous regression, Squamous cell carcinoma
Kelleher Retchford - Substantial contributions to conception and design, Acquisition of data, Drafting the article, Final approval of the version to be published
Catherine Bettington - Substantial contributions to conception and design, Acquisition of data, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published
St. John Newman - Substantial contributions to conception and design, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published
Guaranter of SubmissionThe corresponding author is the guarantor of submission.
Source of SupportNone
Consent StatementWritten informed consent was obtained from the patient for publication of this article.
Data AvailabilityAll relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.
Conflict of InterestAuthors declare no conflict of interest.
Copyright© 2023 Kelleher Retchford et al. This article is distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided the original author(s) and original publisher are properly credited. Please see the copyright policy on the journal website for more information.