Exploring Lung Cancer Clinical Trials

Our Clinical Trials Specialists Will Help You Search for Lung Cancer Studies

The Lung Cancer Alliance Clinical Trial Matching Service, powered by EmergingMed, is a free and confidential pre-screening and referral service that quickly identifies clinical trials to match each patients's specific diagnosis, stage, and treatment history. Clinical Trial Specialists are available by telephone to guide patients, families and health care professionals through a search of over 390 lung cancer studies in the United States and Canada. After an initial pre-screening conversation, your clinical trial specialist is there with you every step of the way to make sure:

• The studies you are interested in contact you.
• All your questions are answered.
• You receive detailed study information to share with your medical team.
• You are not alone in this process!

Our service is designed to give you plenty of time to discuss clinical trials options with your medical team and to weigh the risks and benefits of all treatment alternatives.

What are Clinical Trials?

Clinical trials are scientific studies that help evaluate new cancer treatments for both early stage and advanced lung cancer patients. Some studies test new therapies that are being developed. Other studies test ways to improve current treatments in hopes of improving results and reducing side effects. A clinical trial may investigate:

• New drugs in development
• New combinations of drugs
• Novel approaches to surgery or radiation
• New treatment methods (such as gene therapy)
• Improvements to standard treatments
• New tests to better diagnose and differentiate your specific tumor

Why Search for Clinical Trials?

Too often we talk to patients who rushed into treatment before thinking about clinical trial options, only to find later that they are not eligible for studies because of earlier decisions. Some patients fear receiving a placebo or sugar pill in a clinical trial, when in fact most lung cancer studies don't use placebos.

Other patients assume that their medical teams are aware of all research being conducted for lung cancer. However, there is too much lung cancer research for any one person to remember. New lung cancer studies are launched every day by individual cancer centers, the National Cancer Institute, and pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Only a database that is updated daily can direct patients to every currently available study.

When Should You Search?

We recommend that you conduct a clinical trial search every time you have to make a treatment decision. Clinical trials enroll patients at many different stages:

1. Just before a biopsy (if the trial involves studying tissue from a tumor).
2. Just prior to the first surgery or radiation treatment ("neo-adjuvant" studies).
3. Immediately after surgery or radiation treatment ("adjuvant" studies).
4. After cancer has recurred, spread (metastasized), or is still growing despite another treatment
   • First-line studies: These studies offer the first treatment given once lung cancer has advanced.
   • Second-line studies: These studies offer the second treatment given once lung cancer has advanced and a first-line therapy has failed.

A clinical trial may not turn out to be a patient's best option at any particular time, but the only way to decide is to learn about available studies and be prepared for each window of opportunity to explore.

About the Lung Cancer Alliance

The Lung Cancer Alliance is the only national non-profit dedicated solely to advocating on behalf of lung cancer patients, survivors, families, caregivers and those of risk of the disease. LCA offers unique patient education and support programs focused on helping people directly affected by lung cancer.

About EmergingMed

EmergingMed operates the country's largest cancer clinical trial matching and referral service. More than 58,000 cancer patients have been prescreened and referred to its database of 5,000 cancer clinical trials. The cornerstone of EmergingMed's service is confidential, phone-based support through the clinical trial search process.

Sponsors

The Lung Cancer Alliance would like to thank the following organizations for sponsoring this LCA Clinical Trials Education Series: AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cell Therapeutics, EMD Pharmaceuticals, Genentech, and Sanofi Aventis.